


Down Among the Dead Men

by hetrez



Category: Black Sails
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Time Travel, Angst with a Happy Ending, Canon Disabled Character, Canon-Typical Violence, Eventual Happy Ending, F/M, Fix-It of Sorts, M/M, Mild Gore, Muldoon Is A Good Bro, Multi, Polyamory, Post-Finale, Season/Series 02, Temporary Character Death, Thomas lives, Time Travel, Time Travel Fix-It, Treasure Island Compliant, Unbury Your Gays
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-27
Updated: 2018-04-06
Packaged: 2018-12-07 17:44:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 33,182
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11628624
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hetrez/pseuds/hetrez
Summary: Billy looked at John. "They're saying the god of the sea visits you in your dreams and gives you visions of the future. They're saying that's why Flint listens to you, when he hasn't listened to anyone since he murdered Mr Gates. They're saying you know how they die and if they cross you, you'll whisper it in their ears as they sleep."John should have expected something like this and made a plan for how to manage it, but somehow he had not. He gaped at Billy. "That's the stupidest thing I ever heard," he lied.After the events of Treasure Island, Long John Silver goes to sleep an old and lonely man in Bristol. He wakes up on the eve of Captain Flint's trip to Charles Town and decides that this time, the story is going to go the wayhewants it to go.Or, Being A Remix Of Black Sails Seasons Two Through Four, Because I Have Too Many Feelings After That Goddamn Finale, Most Of Them About Long John Motherfucking Silver.





	1. The Fields of Memory

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [we must unlearn the constellations to see the stars](https://archiveofourown.org/works/11272410) by [lacecat](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lacecat/pseuds/lacecat). 



> Whew. Okay.
> 
> This fic is something by way of an experiment. It's probably going to be about 40k words, which is by far the longest thing I have ever written. I am also posting a WIP for the first time, and posting a long fic unbeta'd for the first time. The WIP status is because I am incredibly impatient and I just want this thing out of my Google Drive. The unbeta'd part is because I don't know anyone in Black Sails fandom who I can pester into editing this monster (see what I did there?).
> 
> If you know someone who would be interested in betaing, feel free to send them my way. Or if you see some egregious error in my fic and it's driving you batty, feel free to let me know and I will fix it. Although I will say, there is something freeing about publishing a story that was written entirely for my own happiness. I go back and forth between thinking that my fic is an exercise in doing only what brings me joy, and that I have a responsibility to get better at the thing I love through adhering to communal standards of quality. So far neither side is winning. Anyway.
> 
> Please see the warnings. There is temporary major character death in this fic, although there is a definite happy ending. If you want to know exactly who I kill off and how, I have posted a detailed summary in the end notes. Take care of yourself, bests.
> 
> This story was inspired by the magnificent [lacecat's](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lacecat/pseuds/lacecat) phenomenal [we must unlearn the constellations to see the stars](https://archiveofourown.org/works/11272410). I started writing this after the finale, and about 10k words in I realized that the entire premise was inspired by her fic, and the concept of time travel in general. There is something fascinating to me about playing with the choices that John Silver, who tries so hard to divorce himself from his past, would make if given the opportunity to go back. Go read her story, if you haven't already.
> 
> The title for this fic comes from the song "Down Among the Dead Men", an English drinking song published in 1728. John Silver probably knows this song well, although none of the other characters have heard it yet.
> 
> A note on Flint and Silver: as you can see, they are in the pairing tags as "Captain Flint & John Silver". I want this story to explore the space their friendship occupies, which to me is intense, distinctive and necessary for both of them, and not a little romantic, but completely non-sexual. YMMV and I support any and all interpretations of their friendship, but this is the one that interests me the most as a writer.
> 
> In this chapter I took Miranda and Flint's conversation in the Guthrie tavern verbatim from the show. I also remixed Flint's line from 4x09 about how Silver knowing Flint's story makes Flint transparent to him. That is such a great line, and such a great concept.
> 
> The passage Thomas reads is from Marcus Aurelius.
> 
> Okay, here we go.

Some of his crew had believed in God. Some had believed in the sea. Some had believed in the warmth of hellfire, and had fought for every ounce of joy they could squeeze out of living, because they knew they would roast come Judgment Day.

John did not remember now if he had ever truly believed one way or another. At the age of sixty-eight he certainly didn't care. John had had his Judgment Day. In fact, life had been generous, and had given him more than one. First, staring down his true friend in the jungle on Skeleton Island, ready to destroy that man and everything he stood for. Second, the day John had brokered peace with Madi's people at the cost of their freedom. Last, the day he had planned a mutiny against Captain Smollett and stolen a bag of treasure from young Jim Hawkins. Each time he had been weighed by circumstance and his soul found wanting.

It had been a small comfort to him for the last twenty-seven years to know that he was master of his own fate. No longer was he buffeted by the storms of others, he told himself. No longer was he held by their passions and their pains. But since his parrot had died and his wife had left him, taking half the treasure he'd brought to her, he had felt no comfort at all. His illness of the lungs, contracted over a long and lonely winter, had felt almost like a relief.

Now, lying on his small cot in his garret in Bristol, with a sack full of worthless gems at his right hand and breathing his last breaths, John did not fear death. He did not fear Judgment. He did not hope for Heaven, or for reunion with loved ones, or for cold and silence beneath the ground. He only hoped, with a passion he had not felt in years, that he could, for a moment, truly remember Madi's face at least once before he was unmade.

He closed his eyes, and did not open them again.

-

In one moment, John was aware, instantly and completely, of several things. First, that he was alive. Second, that he had two legs. Third, that he was staring down into the young face of Billy Bones, and Billy was not trying to kill him. Fourth, that the first rays of morning light had just come over the horizon, shining on the rooftops of Nassau. And fifth, that the explosions he heard in the distance were the result of Captain Flint shelling the fuck out of Fort Nassau in an effort to ruin Charles Vane. It was all an impossibility, but it was real.

"Goddamn," John breathed. His heart, no longer weak with age, heavy food and heartbreak, pounded in his chest like a drum. He brought a hand to his throat, gasping. "Goddamn."

"Silver," Billy said, and oh yes, John thought, _that_ was what Billy had sounded like. John looked around, wide-eyed, and saw Randall (Randall!) sitting in the corner in his filthy sweater. John saw the seaweed hanging from the rafters, and a rough wooden floor. Christ, it even smelled like he remembered it, of sweat and rotting fish and gunpowder. "What happened to Mr Gates?" Billy asked. "You were going to tell me, and then something happened. You look like a man possessed."

"Mr Gates?" John asked. His body, free of pain after so many years, nearly sang. Behind him, outside the tent, people screamed and laughed. They ran toward the fort and ran away from the fort. John licked his lips and tasted salt. If this was a dream, it was unlike any dream he had ever had. He prayed that it was not a dream.

"Yes, Mr Gates," Billy said, clearly at the limits of his patience. He looked exhausted, sad and angry, but not empty nor murderous. "The man who, when I fell off the _Walrus_ , seemed to be the only living creature who could rein in Flint's madness. Did the Spanish kill him?" Billy cleared his throat, and asked, "Did Flint?"

"Flint," John said. He brought his hand from his throat to his mouth. Flint was _alive_. If this were truly real, and not a brief delirium before death, then James Flint was still alive and not buried beneath the earth on Skeleton Island. Mrs Barlow was alive, Charles Vane was alive, Mr Scott was alive, Eleanor Guthrie was alive. Madi was -

Madi.

Oh, God, Madi.

"I have to go," John said.

"What? Wait, Silver -" Billy reached for him.

"I have to, no, I have to go." John stood up (on two legs!) skipping out of the way of Billy's reaching hand. He looked to Randall and said, "Let him go, bring him to the men. They can explain."

Randall opened his mouth, looking as witless as a milk cow, and then closed it.

"Good man," John told him.

"What are you talking about, let me go?" Billy asked. He tried to pull himself up and was caught by the shackle on his leg. "You wretched bastard, you locked me up!"

"Apologies," John said, looking around. Randall had a kitchen knife but there was no sword here, no rifle. John was horribly unprepared. Did he remember this day well enough to change it? _How_ should he change it? "I made a grave error. In an effort to protect the captain from an imagined threat, I forgot that you are a brother, and that you believe as well as I that Flint's way is the only solution."

Billy frowned at him. John had also forgotten that Billy, of all the men, saw most clearly through his bullshit. "I do, do I?" Billy asked.

John said, "Of course. He is the only man living who can keep Captain Hume of the Scarborough from torturing our crew." At that, Billy's expression changed to pure bafflement. John smiled with genuine delight in the face of it. He had forgotten, in recent years, how _fun_ it was to know more than anyone else around him. Today might just be full of miracles, if he could manage to reach for them. He ran out of the tent and onto the beach.

John needed to find Mr Scott. He needed to know what to say when Mr Scott was found. John needed to find a pistol and a longboat, and make his way to Maroon Island. He needed to know what to do when he reached it. But more than anything, John needed to find a way to keep Madi safe this time. She was alive, somewhere not far from here, a walking, breathing gift to him, although fuck knew he didn't deserve it. But if he played his hand right, she would keep living. She would never again need to choose between dying and forgiving him.

-

The last true conversation John had with Madi took place at the top of the cliff where Flint had taught John how to fight and not die. After leaving Flint's body cold and safe in the ground on Skeleton Island, after the treaty with Julius and the Maroon Queen, John had promised Madi that he would wait as long as it took for her to understand, and to forgive him. Madi had made no such promise.

"You are leaving?" John asked, horrified.

Madi stood with her hands clasped in front of her, regal mask in place. She had taken to wearing her old skirts in recent days, instead of pirate trousers and boots. John should have been happy to see her return to this earlier state of being, one where the war had not touched her. He told himself that he was.

"Why?"he asked her. "Does your mother permit this?" He knew it was a mistake as soon as he said it, and bit his tongue.

Madi lifted her chin. "I do not need permission to do what must be done," she told him.

John moved toward her over the sand. "And what is it that needs to be done, that sends you out on the account with Jack Rackham?"

Madi's mask cracked, and behind it, for a moment, he saw devastation. "With the treaty you forced upon my people, there is no opportunity for maroons and slaves on the other islands to come to us and be free. I have resigned myself to losing them. But more of my people come every day from Africa to be delivered to plantations in the New World."

John shook his head. He swung himself closer, and Madi took a graceful step back. He swallowed, and asked, "And what, you're going to rescue them all?"

Madi said, "When the plantation owners in the American colonies do not have the slaves they need to farm cotton and sugarcane, the price of these items increases. I am told that this benefits the estates of New Providence Island."

"Benefits Max, you mean," John scoffed.

Madi snapped, "Benefits a woman who refuses to be a master, and who has freed more of my people than you or I ever did."

John did not answer. The only thing he could think to say was an apology, and that would have been a lie.

Madi looked away, and said, "I am telling you this because I find that my heart still calls out to yours. I am alive to see this day, and if we succeed then I will have found a way to continue the work that you took from me. Perhaps I will discover that it is better, larger work than that which you took from me. I am telling you this because if it is, then I may see a way to forgive your betrayal."

John said, "Then I want to go with you."

"No," Madi said. The weight of her stare pinned him where he stood. "I will never again ask you to be a partner to me. Captain Rackham knows this, and he will not let you on his ship if he wishes an alliance with me."

"Madi," John said, desperate.

"Goodbye, John Silver," Madi said. "When I return, we will speak again."

But she did not return. She left him on the hilltop, and he waited for her, and then Jack Rackham sent word that their hunt had been successful but that Madi had been killed in the fighting. The Maroon Queen had offered for John to continue living in their camp, but he could not. He left a week later on a ship to Trinidad, and from there he sailed to Bristol.

He had thought often since then that, in a sense, his life had ended on that hilltop, although he had continued to breathe for twenty-seven more years before he could finally rest.

-

The time it took for him to find a working Flintlock on a beach packed with failed merchants was also time afforded to him to truly think through his plan. It wasn't enough, he determined, to simply take a longboat and row to Maroon Island. The world would find Madi's people, and when it did John would need to have a means of protecting them that wasn't Flint's thrice-damned war. Too, if Flint arrived in Charles Town, Mrs Barlow would be killed and Charles Town would burn, and there was too great a chance from there of events taking the _Walrus_ to Madi's shores. No, if Flint and Madi were ever to meet, it would have to be without the teeth of their rage and their righteous cause. John could, he supposed, simply kill Flint today, but something inside of him rebelled at the thought of snuffing out Flint's battered, fierce, brilliant soul a second time.

No. If John was to have peace in this second chance at his life, Flint would somehow need to find peace as well. The thought eased him, as the possibility of returning Flint to Thomas Hamilton had eased him in the jungle on Skeleton Island, before things had gone so very wrong.

John found a spot on the beach that was obscured from the jetty, and waited for the longboats to appear. He did not know what had caused Flint to decide to travel to Carolina instead of continuing to hunt for the Urca gold, but he knew it had happened in the morning hours of this day. John watched Flint's longboat arrive, watched the man himself make his way up the beach, watched as Mrs Barlow found him and they had a low-voiced, frantic argument in the middle of the bustle of Nassau. He watched them hurry to Eleanor Guthrie's tavern. He followed.

When he arrived, the tavern was completely empty and he could just hear the sound of footsteps disappearing upstairs. He checked his pistol, his knives and his sword, and, not knowing what he would find at the top of the stairs, stepped carefully up after them.

John could hear voices coming from what he remembered was the parlor. He crept on soft feet, wincing at every creak of the floorboards. But as he came closer to the parlor, he realized that they would not hear him even if he were to shoot his pistol at the ceiling. They were too busy yelling at each other to notice one small, clever man listening in.

Mrs Barlow was saying, "And when you return her, you're going to explain to Peter what it is you're trying to accomplish here: a Nassau that can self-govern. Pardons for your men and a stake in their own future. What you want. What Thomas wanted, what we all wanted. And he's going to help you achieve it."

Then John heard Flint's voice for the first time in twenty-seven years. "He's going to help me," Flint said, sounding beautifully skeptical and annoyed.

John closed his eyes. A voice was a voice, and a man was merely a man. In the end, Flint had been no greater than anyone else. His body had grown cold the same as anyone's. And yet, beyond that door was the man who had shaped John's entire world. Because of Flint, John had found meaning in his crew, had found the woman he loved, had lost his leg, had bartered away his own soul. Flint's voice was not so very special, but hearing it made John tremble.

When he came back to himself, Flint and Mrs Barlow were still speaking. They sounded as if they had stepped closer to the door. John heard Mrs Barlow say, "There is no other way once you're willing to tell the truth about your intentions here."

Flint said, "I think that I have made my intentions very clear."

"No! You've been anything but clear. You say you fight for the sake of Nassau, for the sake of your men, for the sake of Thomas and his memory. But the truth of the matter is it isn't for any of those things."

"What the fuck do you think I am fighting for?"

John had seen grown men nearly piss themselves at the thread of dangerous rage that now wound through Flint's voice. Mrs Barlow was made of sterner stuff, it seemed. But then, he supposed that anyone Flint loved must have a core of steel to them, to be able to match him. "I think you're fighting for the sake of fighting," She said. "Because it's the only state in which you can function, the only way to keep that voice in your head from driving you mad."

"What are you talking about? What voice?"

"The one telling you to be ashamed of yourself. For having loved him."

John frowned. The Flint he had known had not been ashamed. The Flint he had known had cradled his love for Thomas as delicately as a woman cradled a precious child. What changes was John about to interrupt, what future self-understanding was he going to starve, with his new plans? He shook his head. It couldn't matter.

Mrs Barlow said, "You were told that it was shameful, and part of you believed it. Thomas was my husband. I loved him, and he loved me. But what he shared with you? It was entirely something else. It's time you allowed yourself to accept that."

John heard footsteps, the rustle of clothing. He heard Flint say, "The only thing I'm ashamed of is that I didn't do something to save him when we had the chance. That instead I listened to you."

It was luck, then, that had John glancing over the banister to the tavern below, so that he could see Charles Vane creeping past the tables to the staircase and marching up it. John took out his pistol and cocked the hammer, then stepped in front of the parlor door.

Behind him, he heard footsteps and a faint gasp. He put an arm out to shield Mrs Barlow, but didn't turn to look at her. "Stay behind me, if you please," he told her, soft as a breath. Vane had reached the landing and was looking right at him.

John aimed his pistol. From this distance he was a passable shot. He took a step forward, then another, to better his odds. "Were I you, friend, I would turn around and walk back to that fort," he said.

Vane flicked a look at Mrs Barlow, and then glanced at the pistol. Then he launched himself at John.

John fired, the bullet glancing along Vane's side. Vane grunted, staggered, and kept coming. John threw his pistol aside and pulled out his cutlass.

There was a moment, right before Vane's knife hit his sword, when John realized he could have played this very differently. He could have pretended to cower, waited until Vane was distracted and then slashed at his ankles. He could have tried to make Vane believe they were on the same side. He could have offered Vane the fucking warship. The man John had been before all of this started might have done any of those things. The man John was today hadn't even thought of them until it was too late.

Then Vane was on him, and he stopped thinking.

Cutlass fighting had changed little in the last twenty-seven years, but John had changed much. John used the flat of his sword to push Vane's knife down and to the side, pulling the man off balance, and then he struck out with his left fist. Vane smacked his fist aside, and John bashed Vane in the jaw with the hilt of his sword. Vane tipped his head back at the last moment, so that John's sword merely brushed him, and then punched John in the stomach. John doubled over, gasping, and used his shoulder like a battering ram to push Vane back. Vane brought a fist down on his kidneys, and John dropped to the floor and twisted, tangling his legs with Vane's and dropping Vane on his back. Vane was on him in an instant, knife at his throat, and John had just brought up a hand to push Vane's wrist away when Vane grunted, eyes rolling up, and collapsed on top of him. John stared up at Mrs Barlow, who stood over the two of them with a chair in her hands, looking as fierce as a warrior queen.

For a moment, John felt a deep chasm of regret that he had not been able to know Mrs Barlow better the first time around, and then he heard Flint say, "What the _fuck_ is going on here?" from much, much too close.

John closed his eyes. "Charles and I were having a simple disagreement," he said, voice light as he could make it while he was panting for breath. "Nothing to worry about. Mrs Barlow kindly lent her weight to my argument, and reason prevailed."

John heard heavy footsteps come closer, and then someone pushed Vane off of him, leaving him exposed and helpless on the floor. He cracked one eye open, saw the shadow of Flint above him like an avenging angel, and closed the eye again. Flint asked, "Why are you here?"

John took a guess. "Did you not send for me?" he asked.

There was a pause, and then Flint said, "How did you know Vane would be here?"

John said, entirely truthfully, "I had no idea he would be here."

Flint stepped closer, until his boot was nearly on top of John's head. John could smell the leather, hear the faint creak of it as Flint shifted his weight. "Look at me," Flint ordered, and John could not disobey.

He opened his eyes and looked up, and felt it like a fist to the center of his chest. Flint stood over him, looking so _young_ , alive alive alive, and beautiful, and furious. John was horrified to find his eyes welling with tears. He opened them wide and tried to will the tears away. There was no reason, he told himself, no reason at all. This was a reunion like any other, with a man toward whom he had felt nothing but rage for nearly twenty-seven years. His eyes did not agree, nor did his heart. "Hello, captain," he said.

-

John had promised he would wait an hour, a day, a year, but Flint did not want to wait. "You don't understand," Flint said, his voice gentle. "There is no other way."

John said, "There is. There has to be." The scent of the jungle was nearly overwhelming, rich with green and earth and rot. But the air around them was still and quiet, as if the island itself were waiting for a resolution.

"And what is that? You lock me away somewhere? Take me back to England? Those men out there won't let you; they came to kill me." In the time they had known each other Flint had spoken to John with withering contempt, with affection, with helplessness, with the balm of forgiveness. He had never before heard Flint speak to him with such bleak exhaustion. As terrified as John had been these last weeks, this frightened him even more. That he could bring this force of nature, this demi-god, down to the level of mortals with his betrayal, terrified him almost as much as Flint's war had. He had begged Flint not to make him choose, and Flint had forced his hand.

"I control our destinies here," John said, "Not those men."

Flint shook his head. "You must know by now that even a king cannot hold the leash of a man like Hands for very long."

John shook his head. "Please don't make a tragedy out of this. This can be a gift. Captain, Thomas Hamilton is alive."

Flint staggered back and sat on his boulder again. "You hate me so much?" he asked.

"No, captain. James. I found him for you. I found a life, for you."

Flint shook his head, and his eyes filled with tears. John watched them, horrified. "Please stop."

John said, "There's a plantation in Savannah -"

"Stop!" Flint said. Begged.

"Captain -"

"I can understand your betrayal. I can forgive you bringing me here to kill me. But please do not do this, if you were ever truly my friend."

John said, "I don't understand. I am telling you that I -"

Flint said, "You are lying to me, because whatever we have been to each other is not enough. Maybe it was never enough." Flint looked like a dead man, like a man whose soul had been carved out and left on the ground. "You are breaking my heart, and all for -" he stopped, and covered his face with his hands. "You mean it, about Madi's war being a nightmare to you."

"Your war," John said.

"Our war," Flint said. "Hers and mine. You mean it."

John said, "Yes."

Flint was quiet for a long moment, taking shuddering breaths, hands still covering his face. Then he said, "Kill me."

"What?" John pointed his pistol at the ground. "No! I am taking you to Savannah. There is a plantation there -"

Flint lifted his face from his hands, and John could not keep talking. "If I am to have no war," Flint said, "no stake in my own story, no loves, no friendship, no jewels, no alliance, and no control over my own destiny once I step back into that longboat, then there is nothing left. You would be killing me regardless. You must know that. At least this way it will be quick, and I will be reunited with Thomas and Miranda in the next life."

John, agonized, said, "Captain, _please_." This is not what he wanted. He wanted Flint to live, to find happiness like John was going to have with Madi. He wanted Flint to have a future.

Flint said, "I am asking you. I am begging you."

John tried one last time. "But if I wasn't lying. If I was speaking the truth. Wouldn't you want to see for yourself? Wouldn't you want to try?"

Flint asked, "And what would you be bringing him, besides the twisted, broken mirror of a man he once loved? And what would I be giving up to go to him? If by some strange miracle you are telling the truth and Thomas is still alive -" He shook his head. "No. Do not ask me to contemplate it. Kill me. Do it here, do it now."

John didn't move. "No."

Flint said, "This is not your choice. You made your choice."

"No," John said. This was not how it was supposed to go.

Flint's gaze was gentle and devastating. "I miss her, John. Thomas will join us now, or later. Let me see Miranda again."

John had brought shovels. He had brought a man who wanted to see Flint disappear from the face of the Earth. He had brought a pistol, and enough men to dig a hole. Perhaps he had truly meant for it to end this way. He could not look at Flint's face. "What will I tell Madi?" he asked.

Flint said, "I don't fucking know." He sighed. "Whatever will let her keep going. Tell her you took me to that plantation in Savannah. Tell her I was happy, for the first time in a long time."

John nodded. He raised his pistol. "Goodbye, captain," he said.

Flint looked right at him. "I forgive you for everything but the lie," he said. "You have been my true friend."

John fired.

When Hands, Gunn and Morgan found him, he was standing over Flint's body with the pistol still in his grip. Hands looked at John, looked at Flint's body, and said, "Took you long enough."

If John had had another bullet in his gun, he would have killed Hands as well.

-

They returned to the parlor, dragging an unconscious Vane with them. John had somehow gotten his nose bashed in the fighting, which he only noticed when he attempted to smile at Mrs Barlow and tasted blood. He poured water from the ewer onto his sleeve and dabbed at his face, taking the opportunity to look at his hand, the floor, the window - anywhere but at the captain.

Flint tied Vane's hands and feet together and left him curled up against the wall. The slice in Vane's side had already stopped bleeding. John clearly needed to improve his aim.

Mrs Barlow settled herself and the table and looked back and forth between John and Flint, frowning. She said to John, "You were right outside the door when I came out. How much did you hear?"

John swiped at his face one last time. "Enough to know you plan to take Abigail Ashe to the governor of Carolina in exchange for pardons for all of us."

"And?" Flint demanded.

"And I think it's a terrible idea," John said.

Mrs Barlow lifted a hand. "I believe what the captain is asking is, what else did you hear?"

John could not look at Flint, but he could look at her. He put all the compassion his shriveled soul was capable of into his expression. Her eyes went wide. "I heard that you both lost the man you love."

" _And_?" Flint asked again. He sounded worried and furious.

John forced himself to look over. When his gaze landed on Flint it made him ache, but he needed Flint to believe him, believe this. Flint looked back at him as if bracing to be shot. "And I am truly sorry, for both of you. I know," he stopped, and cleared his throat. "I know what it is to lose the one you love."

Flint's expression changed in an instant, from that of a man facing a firing squad to that of a man on the hunt. "What happened to you?"

John made himself laugh. "Well, I was just hit very hard in the face."

Flint shook his head. He walked forward until he was an arm's length from John, and stared. John could not look away. He had forgotten the reality of Flint, how Flint was somehow more real than other men. He had forgotten the shape of Flint's body, the smell of his coat, the clarity of his eyes. Flint said, "You're different now. Yesterday, when I sent you to shore, I would have said you'd never loved anyone in your life, and today . . . you look at me as if I've taken something from you. As if I've given something to you. What happened?"

John swallowed. This had not been his plan. He had not, perhaps, had a plan, but if he had this would have been very far away from it. But here he was, and somehow he knew that this was the moment all their new futures would be decided. He could try to lie, now. Flint did not know him as well as they would know each other in the long months of the war. He could come up with some story to keep Mrs Barlow away from Carolina. He could say Poseidon had given him a vision; sailors, even men formerly of the British Royal Navy, were far more superstitious than they wanted anyone to believe.

John opened his mouth, and found that he could not lie to this man again. "A very great deal has happened to me."

Flint raised his eyebrows. "Yes, I can see that. Tell me what it was."

John glanced at Mrs Barlow, whose stare was nearly as piercing and relentless as Flint's. John told her, "I know things I cannot possibly know. About you. About Peter Ashe."

Flint grabbed John's chin and jerked his face around until they were looking into each other's eyes again. God, the feeling of Flint's hand on his skin. "Start making some fucking sense right now -"

"Peter Ashe was a spy for Alfred Hamilton," John said quickly. He heard Mrs Barlow gasp.

Flint's expression did not change, but his fingers tightened on John's face. "You're lying. You heard the name somewhere and you're making up a story."

John said, "I don't lie about things that can be so easily proven. If you were to visit his mansion in Carolina, you would find a clock in his parlor. That same clock stood in Thomas Hamilton's London townhouse for years. It was a gift from Alfred Hamilton, along with the governorship of Carolina, in exchange for Peter's help disposing of his son."

Flint let go of his face and turned away. John saw Mrs Barlow bring a hand to her mouth. Flint asked, "How can you know that? Are you working for him?"

"Me?" John asked. "I've never met the man."

Mrs Barlow asked, "Then how?" She sounded as if she were about to break.

John shook his head. "I don't know. To me, it's as if I had lived a lifetime, learning from the two of you, from events that spool out ahead of us like a thread unwinding - and then was returned to this moment like the thread winding back into the spindle. I know that in a few months' time, a man named Woodes Rogers will be appointed governor of Nassau, and he will offer pardons to any pirate who will take them. I know that your true names are Miranda Hamilton and James McGraw, and I know why you left London ten years ago. I know that Thomas Hamilton is living today, on a plantation in Savannah, kept secret from the world. I know you, captain. I know the story you want to have told, the dark places you want to see illuminated, for all of us."

It was astonishing, how easy it was to give his secrets away. John watched the line of Flint's shoulders, his twitching hands, and tried to read him. It had been too many years, John thought, and their friendship had come too far in too short a time, for him to understand now. So he wasn't prepared when Flint turned around and punched him in the face, dropping him to the floor.

Across the room, Charles Vane started laughing.

-

John went to see Thomas Hamilton once. It was January of 1721, and Bristol had just received the news that Calico Jack Rackham was dead.

John had little love for Rackham, but they had understood each other, perhaps better than any man living understood John now. And Rackham had known Flint, and Madi, and now there was one less soul in the world who did. There was one less soul who had seen Flint, even for a moment, as a friend.

He went to Sarah, who was serving grizzled seamen in the tavern, and said, "I have to leave."

She turned to scowl at him. "The hell you do," she said. "The _Brycgstow_ , the _Concord_ and the _Saint Helena_ are coming into harbor tonight, and you know those men visit here before their own mums. Who's going to cook for them, eh?"

John felt for Sarah the closest thing to love that he was capable of in this life, but Christ she grated on his nerves. "Get Walter the butcher's boy to help you make a stew, and put enough whiskey in it that nobody'll care about the gristle. They like that better than pork, anyway."

Sarah narrowed her eyes at him. The man at the table by her hip banged his tankard on the scarred wood, and without turning she tipped her bottle of whiskey so it poured over the man's head. "Oy!" the man yelled, and tilted his face up to try to catch the whiskey in his mouth.

Sarah asked, "What has happened?" She knew enough not to ask about his life before 1715, but he respected her enough to tell her everything that had come after. He owed her this.

"Jack Rackham has been hanged in Port Royal," he said.

Sarah crossed herself with the hand holding the tankard. If any man who visited their tavern thought it was strange to see an African woman who was openly and brazenly papist, they had learned to keep it to themselves. She asked, "You visiting his woman?"

John shook his head. Anne Bonny was in gaol with Mary Read. The _London Gazette_ said they had both pled their bellies and been granted a stay. He couldn't go near them, not and keep his head attached to his neck.

Sarah asked, "Well, what, then?"

John said, "I need to visit someone else."

Sarah glowered at him, and then waved him on. "You're an 'orrible cook anyway," she said. "Just come back in one piece."

John leaned over and kissed the top of her head. "For you, my dear, I will surely try."

The voyage to Savannah was melancholy. John hadn't been on a ship in years, and he had only been a passenger once before, on the way from Nassau to Bristol. It gave him far too much time to think, and at the end of it he was left with a knot in his belly and no new revelations, except that he wished the world had been different.

Oglethorpe remembered John's man Morgan, and visibly paled when John stumped into his office. "You know who I am," John said.

"I do," Oglethorpe said. He waved John to a seat in front of his desk, and swallowed nervously when John elected to stand. "I had thought, when the guest you promised never arrived . . ."

John shook his head. "I'm not here to talk about him. Is Thomas Hamilton still living?" Life on a sugarcane plantation was harsh and dangerous. It had been a miracle that Thomas had survived so long, given the man's soft beginnings.

Oglethorpe said, "I do wish you would allow me to protect my charges in the way that I have sworn to do. First your investigator came to violate our privacy, putting the men here in danger of -"

"Oh, spare me," John said. "Do you want money, or shall I threaten you? I am very creative when it comes to threats."

Oglethorpe stared at him, looking like a terrified rabbit. It was disgusting. John, who had been willing to consign his friend to be shackled forever by this coward, was disgusting. "Money will do," he said. John nearly threw the coin purse at his head.

John had arrived in the late afternoon, and night had fallen by the time they left Oglethorpe's office. The air smelled sweet and green and wild, and he could hear crickets in the grass and the swoop of birds' wings over the sugarcane. The sky overhead had a bright slash of clouds cutting through the darkness, a fade of pink and orange in the west, and a thousand tiny points of stars in the east over the horizon. The new world was far more beautiful than the old. It was not less cruel.

The barracks Oglethorpe led him to reminded John unpleasantly of the slave barracks on the Underhill estate back in Nassau. He cast the thought out of his mind, and pushed open the door. Inside were enough men to sail a piragua, many of them older than John. They looked faded and dull, like land animals, and John could not find the man that James Flint would have burned the world for, not anywhere he looked.

He asked Oglethorpe, "Which one is he?"

Oglethorpe pointed. "The one reading in the corner," he said.

John noticed, then, that a cluster of the men were sitting on the floor around a cot at the far end of the barracks. All of them were gazing, rapt, at a frail-looking man lying upon it in state. The man had gray hair and a short gray beard, and he didn't seem like much, but as John walked closer the man looked up and his gaze pinned John in place with its kindness and its curiosity. This was Thomas Hamilton. A different force of nature than James Flint, but a force of nature all the same.

Thomas looked back down at the page he was reading, cleared his throat, and read, "'Remember how long you’ve been putting this off, how many extensions the gods gave you, and you didn’t use them. At some point you have to recognize what world it is that you belong to; what power rules it and from what source you spring; that there is a limit to the time assigned you, and if you don’t use it to free yourself it will be gone and will never return.'"

His voice was weak and breathy. John turned to Oglethorpe and asked, "What's wrong with him?"

Oglethorpe turned away from Thomas and the other man, and leaned close to John. "Thomas has lived here longer than any other man. I try to be kind to my charges, but life here is hard and soon it comes to claim all of us."

John asked again, "What's wrong with him?"

Oglethorpe said, "This past winter he had a malady of the lungs and never quite recovered. I have him on a reduced work schedule, so you needn't worry. He is quite well taken care of."

"You still have him _working_?" John demanded.

Oglethorpe puffed up like a chicken. "The work the men do here is important, not only for the financial health of the estate but for their souls. I would not deprive any man here of -"

John shot Oglethorpe between the eyes. The men of the barracks all turned and stared, but not a one moved. The guard who had accompanied John gave a yell and pulled out his knife, and Israel Hands emerged from the shadows and slit his throat. John watched the guard's body as it slumped to the floor, and then looked up at Hands. "It's done?" he asked.

Hands nodded. "That was the last of them," he said. "Morgan has the keys to the storehouse, he's bringing them here."

John nodded. He looked at the men in the barracks. They were as intent as pirates watching the death of a traitor, and John marveled that only moments ago he had thought them dull. He said, "You're free now."

There was silence as Oglethorpe's blood soaked into John's boot, and then a man asked, "Where will we go?"

Thomas Hamilton, still lying on his cot, stared at John with fathomless blue eyes. "I'm sure we shall think of something," he said, his gaze never leaving John's face.

John gave a respectful nod. "Just so," he said.

Morgan came through the door, breathing hard, and rushed up the aisle between the beds. He handed a keyring to John. "There you are, sir," he said. "The rest of us are leaving, if you please." Most pirates felt nervous this far inland, and with the chaos John was leaving behind him, he understood the feeling. When John nodded, Morgan rushed out again.

John walked toward the back of the barracks, past old men and young men, large men and small men, all of them wearing white, all of them staring. He walked right up to Thomas Hamilton and put the keyring into his hands. "These are the keys to the storehouse and the mansion. Whatever Oglethorpe owned is yours now. Sell it and buy passage to anywhere. Use it to hire laborers and continue the farm. I don't give a fuck."

Thomas's hands closed around the keyring. "To whom do we owe our rescue?" he asked.

John said, "To the pirate Captain Flint."

Thomas's gaze didn't flicker. "Thank you, Captain Flint," he said.

John left the barracks, left the estate, left Savannah. On the road to the harbor he let himself look back, just the once. It had been the right choice at the time, he promised himself. It had been the only choice at the time. Damn Flint for making him regret it.

-

Vane's laugh was an ugly thing, hoarse and nasal, and it made John snarl like a dog. "All of this," Vane said between breaths, "all the murdering, and the scrambling for coin, and the planning, all of it because some piece got taken away from you. You would steal my fort away from me because you lost a fuck."

John watched Flint's face as he took that in. He had never wanted to know what shame looked like on the man, and seeing it now made him furious. He rolled over onto his knees and sat up, and spoke around his aching jaw, "If this wasn't coming from the man sick with love over Eleanor fucking Guthrie, I might be tempted to defend my captain's pride."

Vane stopped laughing and glowered at John instead. "Shut your mouth," Vane said.

John braced himself on the wall and stood up, and stumbled over to Vane. "I really don't think I will," he said.

Vane said, "You've never met me, little man, so don't go thinking you have any fucking idea who I am, or what I want."

John crouched down until they were face to face. He could feel Long John Silver settle over him like a cloak, and it made him smile. Vane's gaze on him sharpened. "Oh," John said, "but I may be the only man on this island who truly does know what you want. Shall I tell you?"

Vane could have brought his tied hands up and walloped John in the jaw. He could have head-butted John, or kicked out at him. He could have made a grab for the knife in John's belt and tried to slit John's throat. But he had made the mistake of letting John talk, and now John had him.

"What the hell would you know about it?" Vane asked.

John said, "I know you want Eleanor Guthrie to love you, but more than that, you want her to _understand_ you." Vane didn't twitch. John kept digging. "I know you want Edward Teach to forgive you, and you hate yourself for wanting it. I know you want coin and women and food, things you can hold in your own two hands. And I know that behind that, more than anything, you want never again to see another man or woman enslaved."

There it was. Vane's eyes went wide, and then narrowed. His nostrils flared. John knew that if Vane had been loose, John would be dead on the floor.

"It's an easy sight to avoid," John said, voice soft, "when you can pick and choose your prizes. You stay away from slaving ships. You stay away from the interior. You ignore Mr Scott and the fact that Eleanor owns him. But there is a part of you, a part that you despise because you think it weak, that wants to free them all. Every man, woman and child in the New World. I know you want this, like I know you want to die on the gallows at a time and place that you choose. Like I know you want to get out of that goddamn fort and back on a ship. We haven't met, Charles Vane, but I know you. Try my patience again, and you'll find out how well."

Vane glared at him, unmoving, for a long moment. John nodded, and stood. "I'm glad we understand each other," he said. "If you were to apologize to my friend for your hypocrisy, it would go a long way toward gaining my good favor."

"Fuck you," Vane spat.

"Ah, well," John said, and turned away. Behind him, Flint and Mrs Barlow were both standing at the table and staring. John swallowed, and dredged up a grin. He clapped his hands. "Well," he said again. "What shall we do now, captain?"

Flint and Mrs Barlow looked at each other. Mrs Barlow tipped her head at John and Vane, and raised her eyebrows. Flint scowled. Mrs Barlow pursed her lips and frowned, and Flint threw up his hands and turned away. John watched, fascinated. As well as he had known Flint, once, he had never been allowed inside the world the two of them had built together. So he was unprepared to see Flint hand Mrs Barlow a knife, and was aghast when Mrs Barlow swept over and crouched on the floor at Vane's feet. She began sawing through the rope tying Vane's legs together.

"What are you doing?" John asked.

Mrs Barlow did not look at him. "I am freeing this man, and allowing him to return to his fort."

" _Why_?" John demanded.

Mrs Barlow finished the rope on Vane's legs, and began cutting at the rope on his hands. John looked over at Flint, who stared at him the way one might stare at an empty wall, when one was imprisoned, perhaps, and wretchedly bored. John looked back to see Vane freed and still sitting on the floor, looking at Mrs Barlow with a faint frown on his hatchet face. Mrs Barlow did not look away. "Because I agree with Captain Vane that no man should ever be in chains."

Vane bared his teeth.

Mrs Barlow smiled at him. "Would you like something to drink?" she asked. "Wine? Rum? I suppose there is no tea here."

Vane sat up away from the wall, and then rolled to his feet. He towered over Mrs Barlow, looking down at her, and John braced himself to fight Vane off. Then Vane nodded to Mrs Barlow, and she _nodded back_ , and he left the room.

Mrs Barlow sighed, and stood up. She handed the knife hilt-first to John, and then went and sat at the table, leaning her elbow on the wood and resting her head in one hand. She tilted her face to look at John and asked, "What is your name, sir?"

John, wrongfooted, said, "John Silver, mum."

Mrs Barlow said, "I am pleased to make your acquaintance, John Silver. My name is Miranda Barlow. You may call me Miranda."

John blinked at her. "Why?" he asked again.

Mrs Barlow waved to a seat and John, baffled, sat in it. He had not had control of a situation taken from him so easily since Madi was alive. Mrs Barlow asked, "Mr Silver, what are you hoping we will do with the information you have given us? You have just informed me that my husband is still alive, that my husband's best friend betrayed him, that the future we have bled and fought and sacrificed for will soon be handed to us, without any struggle at all." She pressed her lips together and looked away. "What outcome are you expecting from all of this?"

John spread his hands. "To be honest, I do not know. All I know is that you must live."

From the corner of his eye, he saw Flint twitch violently.

Mrs Barlow slowly lifted her head from her hand. "And you believe that if I travel to Carolina to return Miss Ashe to her father, I will not survive?" Her tone was even, her words slow and deliberate.

John replied with the same tone. "Perhaps now you might yet live," he said. "Perhaps if you have the suspicion, when entering Peter Ashe's mansion, that he had a hand in destroying your family, then you will not become enraged when seeing the clock in his parlor. You will not stand too close to him. You will not tell him you wish to see Carolina burn, and Ashe's man may not see you as a threat and kill you. Perhaps the captain will not be ruined over your death," there, he saw a flicker in her dark eyes, and he gentled his voice even more, "and sack Charles Town, and begin raiding cities up and down the coast where the magistrates have hanged pirates. Perhaps I have dreamed it all. But I know that if you do not live, we are all lost. Without you it all falls apart." John stopped, exhausted all of a sudden. He closed his eyes. "This was not what I had planned to say to the two of you."

There was a huff of something that might have been laughter from Flint. "What had you planned to say?" Flint asked.

"Oh, something brilliant and opaque, that would bend you to my will without giving away any of my secrets."

Flint said, "If what you are saying is true, then it appears that you have all of my secrets." He sounded agitated but not dangerous.

John imagined it was the presence of Mrs Barlow, her continued existence, that kept Flint from descending into brittle fury, and further into ice-cold, brilliant savagery. It certainly wasn't his affection for John.

John, eyes still closed, said, "You once asked me about my story. You were teaching me swordcraft. You said all warfare asks the same two questions, who was my opponent yesterday and who is he today?" He heard the shifting of cloth, perhaps Flint reaching for something, but didn't move. "You had no idea who I was before the _Walrus_ found me. You and I had each become so invested in the wellbeing of the other that it disturbed you, that I knew so much about you and you knew nothing of me. I told you -" He swallowed. "I told you my story didn't matter. I said I had determined that there was no narrative that I could lay upon my past which gave it any coherence, and I had removed myself altogether from it. But _this_ is my story, captain. For the rest of my life, this is the time that I will come back to, again and again, as the measure of what defines me and propels me forward. I know everything of you, yes, but I am made because of what I know. If you can accept that, you will know everything of me. I will become - transparent to you." He risked opening his eyes.

Mrs Barlow was looking at him with something soft and knowing in her gaze. John flinched away from it. He looked instead at Flint, who was staring down at his own two hands as if they held all the secrets John had not yet divulged.

After too long in silence, John said, "I imagine there are a great many ways forward from here, even if you do not believe me. There are steps you can take to ensure that, should my information prove false, you still -"

"I believe you," Mrs Barlow said.

John jerked his head and stared at her. "What?" he asked.

"What." Flint demanded.

Mrs Barlow said, "You have the look of a man who once built something beautiful, and then tore it down with his own hands. I believe you. The question, Mr Silver, is - what are we going to do about it?"

What _were_ they going to do? John thought of his love for Madi, his wish for peace, his desire to see Mrs Barlow unharmed, his longing for a crew to belong to, his hatred of that goddamned Urca treasure, his knowledge of the future and all the skill at strategy that Flint had drummed into him. He thought of it all and he used it to shape the plan for a new life. One where Madi would be safe. One where he could have the world he wanted.

"Here is what we do about it," he said, and told them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Spoilers for the character deaths in Chapter 1 will follow.
> 
> John Silver dies at the beginning of the chapter, at age sixty-eight, of a malady of the lungs.
> 
> Madi dies a few weeks after the end of Black Sails, in a raid to try to rescue a ship full of slaves. Her death is off-screen.
> 
> Flint dies on Skeleton Island, after that scene from the last episode where Toby Stephens breaks my fucking heart. John Silver tells Flint that Thomas Hamilton is alive, and Flint's response is, "You're lying, clearly you hate me, my life is over, kill me." His death is on-screen but not described explicitly. (I'm sorry!)
> 
> Jack Rackham's off-screen death by hanging is mentioned, and there is the implication that Anne Bonny will be hanged at some point in the future.
> 
> A general note on character deaths: The finale can be interpreted many different ways, and one of them is that Silver killed Flint on Skeleton Island. Fandom has mostly left that interpretation alone, but it's the one I choose to explore here. I am so curious about how it would have happened, and I can only justify it if Flint chose is own way, one last time. As for Madi, I didn't want her to forgive John or accept what he did, although it's implied by the finale and by Treasure Island that she somehow makes her peace with it. I wanted her to stay true to the fierce warrior queen she had become in the show, and stay true to her desire to live and die for her people.


	2. A River of Secrets

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Billy shook his head. "Sometimes I think you're too stupid to survive, and then you do something no other man on the island was smart enough to think of."_
> 
> _"Thank you," John said, "for that dubious compliment."_  
>   
> 
> Or, Being An Account of How John Silver Convinced Many Separate Parties to Agree to His Plans for Changing the World.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have a tumblr now! You can find me at [hetrez](http://hetrez.tumblr.com/).
> 
> I also have a beta. Thank you, new friend! This story is so much better because of her help.
> 
> No warnings in this chapter.

In the late morning, a man set out from the Guthrie tavern with a message for Charles Vane, inviting him back to discuss some items of mutual interest. A second man was dispatched to fetch Mr Scott.

"What you want," John had told them, Flint and Mrs Barlow, "is to upend our ideas about what is right, what is true, and what is possible. A Nassau that can self-govern. Pirates who are men and not monsters. A society free of the yoke of civilization. You want a revolution of the heart and mind." He did not mention the revolution of fire and blood that Flint had wanted, at the last. "There are many ways you can get this."

Flint had asked, "And what exactly are those ways?"

The first way was right now marching past John into the Guthrie tavern, and did not spare him a glance. John bit down on a smile. He turned to shake the hand of the second way, who had drifted inside in Charles Vane's wake and was watching John with a keen, assessing stare. "Mr Scott," John said. "Please come sit and have a drink with me."

John had sailed with Mr Scott before, once or twice in those few brief months before they found Maroon Island, but he didn't quite remember it. The man had always been too far above him, in dignity, in having the ear of giants. Before John was made quartermaster and then king, he was perfectly happy to be down in the belly of the ship avoiding punches, while men like Mr Scott stood above them and made decisions.

But John remembered Madi's deep and vivid love for her father. Flint's sadness at his passing. The man who sat at the bar with him today and graciously accepted a mug of rum was a good man. If John had any hope of saving Madi, then he would have to convince this good man of a great many impossible things.

John took a breath, and started, "There is an island not too far from here."

Mr Scott took a sip of rum. "I imagine that there are many islands not too far from here."

John said, "Ah, but this island is a particular case. The Guthries don't know about it, and the pirates don't know about it, which in these waters would make it an island not to be known at all. But the slaves know about it. You know about it."

Mr Scott, his face still as stone, slowly put the mug down on the countertop.

John said, "And some day soon, someone else will find out about it. Possibly the English. Most definitely the next governor of Nassau. When that happens, I want your people well away from anyone who can harm them."

Mr Scott looked at John, and the air around them became tense with the promise of violence. "It would seem to me that the only man at this moment who could harm them is you."

John raised his hands to show he had no weapons. "Even if I had the power to do so, I have no such inclination. I want to help. I have a plan to help. But it involves you placing your trust in me, and in Captain Flint."

Mr Scott was silent. Into that silence, through the still air, drifted Captain Flint's cry of, "Then what _fucking_ good are you?" from the upstairs parlor. John resisted the urge to pinch the bridge of his nose.

Mr Scott's mug clacked against the wooden bar. John could smell the sea-salt scent of both their clothing, the stench of drying fish outside the tavern, the sharp tang of the rum. He could feel both his feet inside his shoes. For a moment, although this conversation felt vitally important, John forgot it in the pure joy of being alive and young and strong and whole. He came back to himself when Mr Scott said, "I do not know you well, Mr Silver, and so although I wish to believe your intentions are honorable, you will understand why I cannot."

John asked, "What can I do to convince you?"

Mr Scott said, "It is not a question of what you can do now. Men like you, men who were born free and who have never been slaves, sometimes find themselves in situations where they must betray men like me in order to maintain their freedom. Having never experienced what it is to be owned, they are terrified of it; they feel it as an obliteration of themselves. There is nothing that can stop this. I have seen it too many times to doubt that it will happen again." He stood to leave.

John, frantic, stood also. "So, what happens now? You just walk away?"

Mr Scott took the pistol out of his belt and aimed it between John's eyes. "Yes."

"Wait, wait," John put his hands up. "Flint will hear the gunshot."

Mr Scott clicked off the safety. "Yes. This will be the end of my life here on this island."

It couldn't end like this, John thought. He hadn't made things safe for Madi. He grabbed the barrel of the pistol and said, "You're right."

Mr Scott frowned at him.

"You're right," John said again. It was a terrible thing to realize about himself, how very much he believed that he was saying. "I was faced with that choice once, of whether to betray the men around me or experience that obliteration of self. I chose betrayal. I chose wrong."

Mr Scott clicked the safety back on, but did not move the pistol.

John, feeling as if every word were ripped out of him, said, "I thought at the time that I was being brave, but I wasn't. I destroyed the woman I loved, and the man who was as close to me as my own soul. I chose wrong."

Finally, Mr Scott put the gun down. The sound of it settling on the counter was very loud in the stillness. From above, they heard Flint yell, "Jesus Christ, finally."

John huffed a laugh, and then he couldn't catch his breath. He was horrified to find that there were tears in his eyes. He covered his face with his hands and tried to get his breathing under control. He felt like his guts were spilled all over the floor.

Mr Scott asked, "What happened to them? The man and the woman?"

John laughed wetly. "They rescued themselves. They ran toward their deaths, and in finding them found freedom. You're right, that a man faced with what I faced will turn on those he loves. But, having done that once before, I found I have lost the stomach for it. I would rather die myself than ever do it again."

Mr Scott was quiet for a long time, long enough that John had the opportunity to collect himself. He sniffed and wiped his face, and pulled on the ends of his hair. He flexed his toes inside his boots. He coughed, and stood up straight. He opened his eyes.

Mr Scott said, "Perhaps I do know enough about you to judge your intentions. You said you have a plan?" He sat back down again, and waved John to sit as well.

John felt a lightness in his heart, as if something inside him had taken flight. He pulled his stool closer, sat down and leaned in. "I have the outline," he said, "but I will need your help with the details."

Mr Scott said, "Tell me."

John took a breath. "There are twenty-two estates on New Providence Island, and untold kitchen gardens, but only seven plantations are large enough to necessitate an entire village worth of slaves."

Mr Scott nodded. "I know this."

John said, "Yes. What you do not know is that in two weeks' time you, I and Captain Flint will have enough money to buy four of them outright."

"You cannot buy British fields with Spanish dollars. And why would you or Captain Flint do that?" Mr Scott asked. "You are hunters, not farmers. You are pirates, not slavers."

John leaned forward, one elbow resting on the bar. "I want to buy the estates and free the slaves. Every estate on the island. Every slave. I want you to bring your people back here. I want this to be a place that any slave in the West Indies can come, and know that he will be free. I want this to be a haven for all of the New World." It felt electric, to say it out loud. He would accomplish what Flint's war had not. He would be the liberator of the new world.

Mr Scott was quiet for long minutes, watching him.

John frowned, feeling slightly deflated. "I must admit, I was expecting a more vocal reaction to my pronouncement."

Mr Scott said, "I am wondering how you imagine this would work. Have you ever grown sugarcane?"

John said, "I would defer to the knowledge of the men and women who have spent years doing just that."

"These men and women have spent years being tortured for sugarcane. I don't imagine any would want to stay and farm, if given the opportunity to leave."

John said, "So the plantations fail. I will admit, my plan does not factor in how we would eat if everyone stopped farming, but I'm sure we'll think of something."

"You would think of something," Mr Scott said. "Or Captain Flint. Do not mistake the trading of one master for another for freedom. I never have."

John said, "But I won't be in charge of anything. I won't buy it, I won't own it, and I won't run it."

Mr Scott frowned at him. "I do not understand. Who will be buying these estates with your stolen Spanish money? How will they work?"

"As to how they will work, I was hoping to hear how you might do it. As to who would buy it, well. A known pirate can't walk onto a plantation with a chest full of pieces of eight and make an offer. But if a son of London were to come to the island, say, to start a new life with his lady, and had a chest full of pearls - exchanged, of course, for ease of transportation - that's another story. And as to who would truly be in charge, Mr Scott," John said. "That would be your daughter, Madi."

-

Flint's reaction to the news that Billy was alive had been as John remembered: surprise, confusion, trepidation. His reaction to John's suggested use of Billy's particular talents had been astonishment and intractable, furious stubbornness.

"I _will not_ give that man the tawdry details of my life to paw over, like a bandit searches a corpse for valuables," Flint had said. Next to him, Mrs Barlow had flinched.

John had said, "Nothing about your life is tawdry, captain. But if you want a revolution of the soul as well as the colony, then we must create a story that people will revolt for."

Flint had scoffed. "And you think my tale of sodomy and madness -"

Mrs Barlow had said, merely, "James," and Flint had fallen silent.

By the time they got to the men on the beach, Flint was nearly calm. Or, at least, he had ceased to look murderous when he glanced in Silver's direction. Perhaps that was because he had ceased looking in Silver's direction. When they arrived at the tent where Billy stood surrounded by his brothers, John watched Flint hold himself stiff and wary, and then move to shake Billy's hand. There was no hug this time. Flint said, "I am glad that you live. I would speak with you, if you would hear me."

Dufresne stepped close. "Captain, I'm sure you can understand why leaving you alone with Billy is not the best idea."

Flint scowled at him. "Who the fuck are you to make that decision?"

Dufresne looked around. "I believe I am one of many," he said, and in an instant the other pirates in the tent seemed to loom all around them.

Billy said, "No, I want to speak with him." Dufresne looked almost comically betrayed, and the tension in the crowd was snuffed out like a candle.

John stepped forward. "Besides," he said, "I'll be there. That's hardly alone with the captain."

Some of the men nodded. Muldoon, Dooley, Joji. Dufresne smiled his horrible snake smile at John. John wished he had a metal boot to put through Dufresne's face. He let some of Long John Silver into his answering look, and Dufresne rocked back on his heels. Let that be a lesson to you, fool, John thought.

Outside the tent, Hornigold stood waiting with Mr Scott behind him. "Well?" he demanded, as Flint marched past him up the beach. Flint did not answer. "Sir, the men here have a right to know if they will get the fight you have promised to them."

Flint stopped and turned to him. They stood between Hornigold's crew near the rifle boxes and Flint's crew at the tent, in the middle of a crowded beach. When Flint spoke, his voice was pitched to carry. In moments, the story of this conversation would spread into Nassau town, and nobody would believe that Flint had deliberately crafted the moment. Christ, John loved him. "Perhaps you can help me with that, captain," Flint said.

"Oh?" Hornigold asked, looking greedy and delighted. "Are we to make our way up the beach now? Perhaps you can gather your vanguard." John, well-versed now in the politics of pirate captains, nearly laughed at how transparent a challenge it was.

Flint said, "You misunderstand me. Captain Vane has offered terms for vacating the fort, and as they would require me to weigh the safety of my men against my promise to you, I ask that you help me in making the decision. If it were me, I would say the hell with my good name, that the safety of my crew is paramount. But perhaps you do not feel the same."

Hornigold's look of delight melted into incredulous affront. "I beg your pardon, captain."

"You have it," Flint said. "I spoke with Captain Vane in the Guthrie tavern not an hour ago. He informed me that he had been willing to allow us safely into the harbor with the Urca gold, had we been able to retrieve it, and it was a tragic misunderstanding which led to our conflict. He further said that he would willingly leave the fort now, in exchange for sailing in consort with my crew. He wishes to be a hunter again. As I knew you wanted the fort, and as I also knew I had promised you the opportunity to sail with me, and further as I wished each and every man whose life is my responsibility to see the sunset tonight, I hesitated to give Vane an answer."

Flint made no mention of the Urca gold, and while they were in public Hornigold could not either. John nearly applauded at the showmanship of it. If Hornigold now asked to join Flint on the account, after willingly risking the safety of Nassau to get his fort back, he would look like a greedy fool. If he chose the fort, most of his men would desert him for Flint's crew and the promise of the Urca treasure.

Hornigold clearly understood this. He looked ready to spit poison. "You would break your promises to me in a cowardly bid to save your own skin?"

Flint looked behind him at the men of his crew. "If it were only me, I would lead the charge up that beach myself. But we just had one brother back from the dead." Here he waved at Billy. "I am not so ready to lose any more. Not when there is a peaceable compromise at hand."

"If you were a real captain," Hornigold said, "you would not be so weak as to take this traitorous _compromise_."

Flint put a hand on the hilt of his sword. "If you were a reasonable man," he said, "you would understand that there are no perfect solutions, only compromises. But let us put it to a vote. Mr Dufresne?"

Dufresne came out from the huddle of men at the mouth of the tent. He looked irritated and confused. "Captain?"

"Take a count, please. If the men wish to make a charge up the beach to try to re-take the fort for Captain Hornigold, I will abide by the choice. But if instead they wish to seek a resolution here on land, so that they can continue hunting at sea, I will abide by that as well."

Dufresne frowned, looking around them. He must have understood what Flint was doing, and he clearly wanted no part of it. But as quartermaster his duty was clear. "All in favor of making a charge up the beach, say 'aye'."

There was dead silence.

"All opposed," Dufresne said, although he needn't have bothered. The crew loudly cast their votes 'nay'.

Flint inclined his head to Hornigold. "I apologize, sir, that I could not achieve a perfect solution for you. But you will get one of the two outcomes you hoped for. Which is it to be?"

Hornigold glared at him for long moments, then spat, "The fort."

Flint nodded, and said, "I will give the news to Captain Vane. Come Silver, Billy."

Flint continued up the beach, leaving John awash in admiration and biting his tongue to contain his hilarity. Before John turned to follow, he saw Hornigold's gaze on Flint's back turn murderous. He would have to do something about that very soon.

"Jesus," Billy muttered to John. "If the English weren't at our doorstep, I would say that man was the most dangerous in Nassau."

John clapped Billy on the shoulder, and ignored Billy's glare. "But the English are on our doorstep, and besides, I am much more dangerous. Come along."

-

They settled back in the Guthrie's parlor: John, Billy, Flint, and, after a moment, Mrs Barlow. Upon seeing her, Billy's eyes grew round with surprise. Mrs Barlow walked up to Billy with her hands folded demurely in front of her. "Are you the man they call Billy Bones?" she asked.

"Yes, mum" Billy said.

"My name is Miranda Barlow. Please call me Miranda."

Billy looked pleadingly at John, as if hoping for a rescue. John shook his head. He had not been able to combat Miranda's weaponized civility any more than Billy could. Billy cleared his throat. "Yes, mum. Miranda."

Mrs Barlow said, "I must apologize for the trouble I have caused. I wrote a letter, you see, which spoke of the captain betraying his men."

John had known none of this. He kept the surprise off his face and waited to see how it would play out this time.

Mrs Barlow said, "I believe this letter led you and Mr Gates to distrust him, which had a hand in Mr Gates's death. I -" She stopped, bit her lip, looked away. She took a deep breath and looked back. It was masterful. "I lied. I have wanted so badly for so long to have a quiet life with James, and I thought I had the opportunity. I did not understand what Nassau means to him. I was too caught up in - well, the captain will explain. But please accept my humblest regrets for the pain I caused you."

Billy, astonished, looked up at the captain. "James?" he asked.

Flint waved Billy to a chair. "Sit down. I have much I wish to discuss with you." Flint settled into his own chair, looking weary and wary. His shoulders were stiff, and John wished to place a hand on one of them, but he knew this Flint would not welcome it. John had not earned the man's regard, here. Perhaps he would never again deserve it.

John shook his head and took a seat as well. Mrs Barlow also sat, and then the four of them were looking at each other and waiting.

Flint took a breath. "I would like to tell you a story of a man named James McGraw. If you have any questions at the end of it, I will answer them. But please don't stop me in the telling." He looked up and waited until Billy nodded, and then he sighed. "Ten years ago, James McGraw was a lieutenant in the British Royal Navy. He was assigned as liaison to a Lord Thomas Hamilton, whose father was Lord Proprietor of New Providence Island. Lord Hamilton had been tasked with ending the scourge of piracy in Nassau."

Flint looked down. He twisted the rings on his fingers. He took a breath. "Lord Hamilton was - a visionary. He saw a world filled with good men who had been reduced to crime and piracy by difficult circumstances, not moral failure. He wished to change the circumstances. He wished to change the world. Lord Hamilton conceived of a plan to offer pardons to all of Nassau's pirates, and give them meaningful work, that they might seek a better life than any they could find on the account. McGraw fell in love with Lord Hamilton. McGraw also fell in love with Hamilton's wife, Miranda."

At this, Billy's eyes went wide. He stared at Mrs Barlow, at Flint, at John. John lifted a hand to hush him. Billy's eyes grew wider, and his mouth pressed into a thin line, but he did not interrupt.

Flint said, "McGraw had five months of happiness, three of them on the sea with just the memory of those he loved. He had never been a dreamer, but he allowed himself to dream of a future in which he, Thomas and Miranda could make a life for themselves on a prosperous, peaceful Nassau. When he returned from his sea voyage, it was to find himself discharged from the Navy. Someone had discovered the affair, and used it to condemn Thomas to Bethlem Royal Hospital for madness. McGraw and Miranda escaped penury and prison in England - and made their way to Nassau, where McGraw took the pirate name of Flint. Thomas, they were told, died in the madhouse."

Mrs Barlow lowered her head, her hands twisted together.

Flint said, "For ten years, Miranda and I have sought to bring about Thomas's vision for a peaceful Nassau. We knew England would never allow pirates to be forgiven, and would never allow men they deemed monsters to prosper. The only way I could imagine it was to amass so much wealth, band together so many men, that when England came with her ships and her guns, the fight they would encounter would be too brutal to justify in Parliament. That was why I was chasing the Urca gold. It is still why I am chasing the Urca gold. But I have a new plan now, and I need your help. I think it will save us from that fight, and I think it will save us from being crushed in the maw of civilization."

Flint stopped, his face twitching. John saw a tender grief, a vulnerability that he had not seen since the war, when he and Flint had been true partners. Billy looked at Flint, as if weighing him. Flint allowed himself to be examined. John imagined it to be excruciating.

Billy asked, "Is that your story, then?"

Flint said, "Yes. All of it I can bear to tell."

Billy nodded at Mrs Barlow. "And is it hers?"

Mrs Barlow said, "All of it I can bear to have told."

Billy looked at all three of them. "Why did you never speak of this? If Mr Gates had known -"

"I didn't trust him," Flint said. "I didn't trust anyone. You must understand, the last time I put my faith in a man I was not in love with, Thomas was taken from me."

"If Mr Gates had known," Billy insisted, "he would have understood. He would still be alive."

Flint said, "Yes, he would have."

Billy pointed to John. "What about him? Why trust him and not a man you'd known for ten years?"

John said, "Er, I discovered the information independent of the captain."

Billy frowned at him. "You what?"

John said, "When I first made my bargain with Captain Flint, my life in exchange for the Urca schedule, I employed a spy to discover what I could of his history." Not a lie. That John himself had been the spy was of no importance. "When I uncovered this tale, I chose to lend him my support in his endeavors." In his long years, John had discovered that any number of questions could be justifiably answered with, 'I have an informant.'

Billy said, "A spy." He shook his head. "Sometimes I think you're too stupid to survive, and then you do something no other man on the island was smart enough to think of."

"Thank you," John said, "for that dubious compliment."

Billy ignored John. He leaned forward over the table and put his hands together. "So what now, captain? Why tell me this? Am I to keep this secret for you as well?"

Flint shook his head. "No, that is not my plan."

Billy asked, "Then what the hell is your plan?"

Flint said, "Your parents were agitators in England. They wrote pamphlets. They understood how to sway men's hearts and minds, and they passed that knowledge down to you. I don't want you to keep my story a secret, Billy. I want you to tell everyone."

Billy was silent after this pronouncement. John watched Flint jaw and eyebrows tense, and Mrs Barlow's knuckles go white as she twisted her hands together. He was about to speak when Billy asked, "Why? You've spent ten years hiding this, when you know most of the men on that beach wouldn't care who you're fucking. And now you want me to, what, write a pamphlet? Tell me why."

Flint opened his mouth, then closed it again.

John decided that was his cue. "Civilization is coming and you know it. It found you in the water, it tortured you on the beach. It's camped out on Harbour Island right now. But civilization doesn't come from the colonies, it comes from England."

"What are you talking about? Those are _English_ colonies."

"English colonies," John said, with all the confidence of a man who had watched it happen, "which are left wholly unprotected and unsupported by England, but taxed enough to nearly cripple their economies. English colonies where men considered to be the the debris of society have been sent to waste away, hidden and ignored, unless a Lord Proprietor wishes to tell them what to do. It may seem as if the colonies and England are one and the same, but I promise you there is tension between them. There is also an entire ocean. If we can drive a wedge between England and the Americas, it will distract them from Nassau and their little pirate problem. And a wedge like this needs a human story."

Billy looked at John, at Flint, at Mrs Barlow. "Nobody in England or the Americas would see it as anything other than criminal. That's why we're _here_. Because we don't matter and nothing we love matters to them."

John slapped a hand on the table, and Billy jumped. " _Make it matter_ ," he said. "Men of the New World are brave and strange and wild, and they have no fear, and they know God loves them. They make their homes and live their lives, and England sails in on her ships and defiles these men's joy. You, gentle reader, you believe it's wrong because you were told it was wrong. But what if it was truly England that was wrong?" He waved a hand. "There, I just wrote your first pamphlet. The next one will be about taxes, and the third about the evils of one man being slave to another."

Billy shook his head. "It won't work. You weren't there. You don't know how they looked at me, at us."

John said, "It doesn't have to work. It just has to keep them away from here, and focused on the colonies. But I think you're wrong. I think it will work. I think you can make anyone believe anything. I think you want to try."

Billy's expression changed, then. He said, "You're asking the sun to move backwards," but John knew he had him.  
-

After Billy left, Flint and Mrs Barlow stepped out onto the balcony for a low-voiced conversation. They were too far away for John to make out what they were saying, but he watched them from half-shut eyes as they talked. Whatever viciousness had passed between them this morning before Vane's arrival had disappeared, and now they appeared united, a team. John surprised himself by feeling relieved. At least here, now, Flint had someone he could truly depend upon.

On the heels of that thought, overpowering the relief, was a knife-blade of envy shoved up behind his ribs. Not since he had betrayed Flint and Madi had John shared anything with anyone, even his dear Sarah, that came close to matching what Flint and Mrs Barlow had.

Suddenly John was hit with a wave of exhaustion. It was late afternoon, and the sunlight was rich and heavy and yellow, like nothing he'd seen in years. A day ago he had been alone, old, a man too tired to put on a mask. Pirate argot laid aside, violence tucked away. Today he was young and had two legs and a crew, and he was frantically laying a plan that required him to be a man he hadn't been in decades.

It was easy to forget how much he had hated Billy, at the end. How good it had felt to slaughter Dufresne. How angry he had been with Flint for so many years. How empty he had felt after losing Madi. It was so easy to leave that all behind with the salt-crusted relic who had almost killed Jim Hawkins on Skeleton Island, and the coward he had played at when he first boarded the _Walrus_ , and the pirate king. It was too easy to just be Flint's man again. The thought was terrifying.

"What a goddamn day," John muttered to himself. He rubbed his hands over his face, and paused.

From the balcony, he heard Mrs Barlow ask, "Is everything all right, Mr Silver?"

John glanced at her, hands still covering his chin. She and Flint stood in the doorway, watching him with twin looks of wary curiosity. "Yes, of course," John said, and then his traitor tongue got away from him. "It's only that I don't have a beard anymore."

"You had a beard, in your - other life?" Flint asked. He spoke with all the skepticism that Mrs Barlow had not shown John in hours.

John raised his eyebrows. "You have spent all this day planning a future based on my - other life." Flint was smiling, that little sneering smile he got when he thought he was the tallest man in the room. John couldn't decide if he wanted to bristle at Flint's condescension or cheer his spectacular, pugnacious soul. The man would probably lay siege to the gates of Heaven while Saint Peter hid behind a column and screamed, 'You stupid fuck, you were _goddamn invited in_.' The thought tipped John to the side of celebration. He grinned. "If you were going to doubt me, it is perhaps several hours and several bargains too late."

John's amusement seemed to baffle Flint more than anything else that had happened that day. The little sneering smile dropped off his face, replaced by a look of perfect disgruntlement. John's grin widened.

Mrs Barlow, looking back and forth between them, said, "It would seem that many pieces of this chess match are in place."

John allowed himself to be distracted. "Mr Scott is going to find you appropriate clothing and a carriage. Are you sure none of the estate masters will suspect anything?"

Mrs Barlow shook her head. Her smile was gentler than Flint's, but it still gave John the sense that he was a small man in the presence of giants. "I do not need to convince the gentlemen, Mr Silver. I need to convince the ladies. Many of these women came from wealthy families in England or the colonies. I know that world. I navigated its waters for years. Give me the appearance of Lady Hamilton, and I will make it enough of a reality to buy your plantations."

Flint said, "If we can exchange enough Spanish gold to allay suspicion of just how we came to have enough money to buy an entire fucking island."

John frowned. "You believe that you cannot? I did not want to have to involve her, but I suppose Max can -"

"The brothel madam? No, don't tell me." Flint waved this aside. "If we can exchange the money, and if Mr Scott's men are true to their word, although you have not yet explained to me what is so valuable to him that he will undermine the Guthrie family -"

John shook his head. "I have told you, I sailed with the man and I know him. I can be very persuasive to someone who isn't you."

"And _if_ ," Flint continued, voice going strained, "Thomas Hamilton is where you say he is."

So that was it. John narrowed his eyes. "You can't have it both ways, captain. You can't put all your weight behind my decisions and then accuse me of lying."

"Oh, I can," Flint said.

John wanted to slap the man. "No, you cannot. I now hold more lives in my hands than you can possibly imagine. I have just committed to being quartermaster to one third of the population of the goddamn West Indies, including the woman I love and _you_ , you stupid fuck. I will not have that put in jeopardy because you are the only man in the world who has learned how to exist in a state of complete trust and complete mistrust at the same time. Make a decision, and do it now."

By the end of that little speech, John was on his feet and shouting. Flint stared at him, face going from surprise to affront to speculation to anger, and was silent. The moment stretched, as moments with Flint did, until Mrs Barlow said, "James."

Flint looked at her, and then down at the floor, and the swept onto the balcony again, his back to John. Mrs Barlow stepped into the room.

"You must understand," Mrs Barlow said, "What you are promising us, it is not only an impossibility, it is beyond any of the wildest hopes we have had these past ten years."

John sagged. "I understand," he said. "That man went to war with the entirety of civilization in your name, and the name of your husband. He was close to burning the world down. I understand exactly what I am dangling in front of your noses, and I understand he will flay the skin from my body if I am lying. I even understand that trust is learned, and it takes more than a handful of hours to build faith in someone who is, in essence, a stranger to you."

Mrs Barlow said nothing.

"But," John said. " _You_ must understand that I have committed to something larger than myself, larger than the three of us. I can't put that aside and wait for either of you."

Mrs Barlow cocked her head, frowning. "Strange. It sounds as if you're threatening us, but I am certain that you are not."

John said, "I will never do anything to directly harm either one of you. But if I must, I will walk past you and leave you behind."

"Even if, as you have planned, my husband ends up owning the seven largest sugar plantations on New Providence Island."

"Even then," John promised.

Mrs Barlow nodded. "And you truly believe what you said before? That the love Thomas and James and I shared was not merely to be tolerated, but admired?"

John did not have to choose his words carefully this time. The answer was already there on his tongue, as if he had been waiting for her to ask. He said, "I think this world is a place of unending horrors, and finding one single thread of joy in it is what a man of faith would call a miracle. Yes, you are to be admired."

Mrs Barlow's expression did not change, but her eyes began to shine and he hands twisted together until the knuckles were white.

From the balcony, Flint asked, "Who is it?"

"What?" John asked.

Flint turned and came to lean against the door frame next to Mrs Barlow. "The woman you love, who is she?"

John felt grief and impatience and adoration claw at his throat. "A princess of a maroon island not far from here. Madi."

Flint's gaze sharpened. "That's why the sugar plantations. You don't give a fuck about freeing the men and women of Nassau."

"I assure you that I care very much," John snapped. "But I'm not like you, or her. I can't wed myself to an ideal. I need people at the center of my war. For a long time you were the center. Then it was Madi. That does not mean I care nothing for the others. In fact," he frowned. "I might argue that my claim is the stronger one."

Flint looked affronted. "What are you talking about?"

"If we are fighting a war _for_ the people, then is not every soul precious? Should we not hesitate over every sacrifice? But if we are fighting for the _idea_ of the people, then how much easier is it to throw body after body into the fight, with no care for the toll of it?" John caught himself, laughed, shook his head. "Damn. All these things I've wanted to say to you for so long, and now that I have the words, you don't care enough to listen."

Flint said, "I listen."

"The way you listen to Billy or Mr De Groot? No, thank you." John said. "I'd rather not."

Flint opened his mouth, glanced at Mrs Barlow, and closed it again.

"Well then," Mrs Barlow said briskly, as if the whole conversation had never happened. "While our goals align, we'd best get to work. What's next?"

What indeed? John said, "Next we find the right captain to fetch Thomas Hamilton. I have an idea of how we can do that."

-

When John and Flint returned to the beach, it was to a crew that had swelled from 33 to 67 in a matter of hours. They also received news that the crew of the _Walrus_ had been missing one significant member for more than half the day.

Flint looked at John, and John had to work to keep the smug expression off his face. "I think you'll find that my memory of this incident is very clear," he said.

Flint said, "I think I'll find that you're a wretched annoyance."

John headed for the brothel. "Be that as it may," he said, "you need me for this and you know it. A little grace in your capitulation would be nice."

"Fuck yourself," Flint told him.

John smiled.

Max was where he remembered her, passing out drinks and giving directions. She turned at John's greeting, and when she saw Flint her eyes went big and terrified. John said, "I'd like a word upstairs, if you please."

Max waved her hand at the crowd around them, making an admirable show of nonchalance. "As you can see, I am occupied at the moment. However, if you wish to make time with one of my girls -"

Flint said, "You know why we're here." His voice held all the feral menace he was capable of. It made Max lift her chin in defiance, and for a moment John regretted that he had not been on the same side of the war as this woman. "You heard him; a word upstairs. Now."

Max tried to lead them away from the room where Logan and Charlotte lay dead, but John moved past her and opened the door. Flint, when he saw Charlotte's bloody hand, scowled. Max saw his scowl, gathered herself, and led them inside.

The smell of blood and shit was stronger than he had remembered. Logan and Charlotte had not been dead long enough to attract flies, but soon Max would have to do something about them. John didn't speak as he looked around the room, and neither did Flint, and the tension ratcheted up and up.

Finally, Max said, "I understand what this means to you and your crew. As madam here anything that happens under this roof is my responsibility, and I _will_ see that it is made right."

Flint said, "I want the name of the person who did this."

Max shook her head. "I am sorry to tell you that I do not know."

John told Flint, "I imagine it was one of the other girls, or perhaps Miss Bonny."

John was hoping Max would flinch. But she seemed to have encased her heart in glass, and her body gave away no secrets. "If it had been one of my girls, I would of course -"

Flint asked John, "Why do you say that?"

John said to Flint, "There's nobody else on the island she has an interest in defending."

Flint said to John, "The girls I can understand, but who is Anne Bonny to her?"

Max's mouth went tight. John watched Flint notice. John said to Flint, "They're lovers."

"Ah," Flint said. He took a step toward Max. "So you will follow our code when it suits you, and only then. You who would become the queen of Nassau have no respect for our rules unless they benefit you and yours."

Max's jaw was tight, her shoulders squared. She did not look afraid.

In a moment, Flint transformed from a dread pirate captain to a man. He tipped his head down and gave Max one of those devastating half-smiles, the ones that invited you to laugh with him, cry with him, and burn the world down if he asked. John watched Max's shoulders ease, and her smooth-glass expression melt into a concerned frown. Flint said, "As it happens, I am in need of a favor, involving the health and well-being of someone I love very much. Perhaps, knowing that you are in need of a similar favor, we can come to some kind of agreement."

Max said, "It would seem that you also follow your code only when it suits you." There was no judgment there, only curiosity.

Flint said, "I think you'll find that love has its own code."

Max nodded at him. He nodded back.

John said, "Now, the nature of our favor is sensitive, and it involves a vulnerability that Captain Flint would rather not make known to the men here on the island. Can we trust you with that vulnerability, knowing that you have such a weakness of your own?"

Max looked down at Logan and Charlotte, over at the scratched mirror, at John and Flint. She said, "It does not matter what weakness I do or do not have. I can promise that no matter what agreement we come to, I will not betray your confidence. We who are true lovers understand each other, I think."

Flint said, "We do." He took a breath. He said, "There is a plantation in Savannah," and Max listened.

-

Finally, there was no more planning left to be done. Mrs Barlow received a filthy and frightened Abigail Ashe and spirited her away to a little cottage in the interior. Flint, Vane and Mr Scott set about preparing the fucking warship to sail back to retrieve the gold. Flint's men and Hornigold's men returned in longboats to the fucking warship and set to regular watches again. And John could rest. For a few blessed hours, at least until morning, John did not have to worry, or negotiate, or convince anyone of anything.

When John went to sleep that night, snug in his hammock on the _Walrus_ , it was with the true and complete certainty that, whatever their tomorrows would hold, things would not end the way he had ended them before. Something new was being built. This time he would have a chance to do it right.

And Madi was coming. John closed his eyes and brought his clenched fists up to his chest. The thought was nearly unbearable. The wait was nearly unbearable. First the gold, then the plantations, then Madi.

Madi, Madi, Madi.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I can't decide if John's suggestion for Billy's pamphlet would make sense for the time period. On the one hand, Calvinism was going very strong in the New World, and the Calvinists were _intense_. They basically lived off of their belief in predestination and original sin, and hated sex, art, music, and anything else that would bring people joy. No way would a Puritan in Massachusetts, or a French Huguenot in New York, or a Scotch-Irish Presbyterian in Appalachia truck with John Silver's argument for happy queer threesomes.
> 
> On the other hand, the Age of Enlightenment started in the early 1700s. The Enlightenment really pushed ideas of tolerance, a sense of fraternity, reason and rationality, a separation of church and state, and an end to religious dogma. So, maybe? I'm going with it.


	3. The Transformation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _"He wants the man he loves," John said. "He wants the woman he makes a home with. He wants those pamphlets you said you'd write. He wants a self-governing, peaceful Nassau. He wants an England that will look at us and realize what a wretched, terrifying mistake it made the day it threw us all away." John shrugged. "Admittedly, that one might require a little violence, but he's handed that work off to you and Vane, and you have accepted it. Flint thought he was alone in his goals. He thought he could only buy these things with his captaincy, could only barter with his own soul. But we have all found a new way."_
> 
> _Billy looked unconvinced._
> 
> _"You'll see," John said. If Mrs Barlow lived, if Thomas lived, if Woodes Rogers never gained a foothold and Billy was never pitted against the Underhill slaves, they would surely have a better outcome than the one he remembered. Flint would illuminate the dark not with a city on fire, but with a million tiny points of stars._
> 
>  
> 
>    
> Or, Being an Account of How John Silver Sailed for the Urca Treasure, Convinced His Crew to Join the Republic of Pirates, and Lost Something Precious to Him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have added more tags, some sad ones and some happy ones. Warnings for canon-typical violence and gore in this chapter, as well as significant bodily injury to a main character. See the end notes for details.

Charles Vane had no ship, which was a boon because the fucking warship had too many stations for even Flint's expanded crew to properly man. With the men from Captain Hornigold's crew and the men from Vane's, as well as three former slaves that Mr Scott trusted, they had one hundred nineteen souls aboard. That was enough to be going on with, John supposed.

The trip back to retrieve the gold was excruciating. John had allowed Flint's scouts to inform the crew that the treasure was nearly undefended on the beach, and the men were in high spirits the whole way. Flint and Captain Vane, however, had not come to the same understanding in this life that they had in the last one, and their screaming matches traversed the length, breadth and depth of the fucking warship. John found it difficult to stay away, as Flint and Vane were often exactly where Mr Jenks was not, and John had no desire to see that man's face ever again. Also, John would admit to himself some slight draw to be where Flint was, if only to make sure the man didn't destroy his own future with his goddamned temper.

This morning at eight bells, Captains Vane and Flint could be heard arguing over the existence of trade winds from the captain's cabin. John could not fathom why, as it seemed they agreed on all points. It was a talent of Flint's, he supposed.

John heard Vane growl, "You are not the only captain here."

Flint yelled, "I will be if I cut your throat and dump your body in the _fucking_ sea."

"Christ," John muttered to Mr Scott, who was standing serene by the wheel and looking out at the horizon. "I am going to bash their heads together, I swear it. Why aren't you doing something about this?"

Mr Scott had been voted quartermaster by a wide margin, and so far had managed to act the complete opposite of Mr Gates in regards to handling Flint. Now he said, "My job is to protect the men of this crew. It is easier when those two are distracted by their hatred of each other, instead of jointly making foolish, dangerous decisions."

John raised his eyebrows. "There is that," he allowed.

Behind them, Vane thundered out of the captain's cabin, looking like a falcon on the hunt. Men not on duty scattered like rodents, not wanting to be the one to catch Vane's eye.

John said, "And with that, I take my leave of you." He tipped his head at Mr Scott, and then followed Vane to the foredeck, where the man was now aggressively sharpening his sword next to a nervous-looking Muldoon.

John caught Muldoon's eye and tipped his head. Muldoon, looking grateful, handed John his swab and bucket and escaped aft. John splashed water on the deck at Vane's feet, and then swept it over his boots. Vane looked at him, expression cold and murderous as a lizard's. "You know," said John, "you two would be much better as friends than as rivals."

"Is that so?" Vane asked. His voice held the promise of a quick and easy death.

John, who had years ago learned that dangerous men won't kill you if they're curious what you have to say, and who had cut his pirating teeth on the glares of one Captain Flint, was not impressed. He kept swabbing. "You were before, and it was, quite frankly, terrifying."

Vane squinted at him. "In that mythical future time that is now, by your actions, guaranteed not to exist."

John grimaced. "Yes, I can see why you would be skeptical."

"I won't be subordinate to him, and he cannot be subordinate to me. No alliance can be made without a balance of power."

John said, "You consider Eleanor Guthrie your equal."

Vane suddenly loomed over John, sword up. There was a commotion from behind John as his men saw the threat and Vane's men saw his men move, but John held a hand up and they all quieted. Vane growled, "Twice you've tried to use her name against me. There will not be a third time."

John was older, and he had loved so deeply - once, possibly twice - that it had buried itself in his bones. He knew what a man looked like when he was undone. He said, "Twice now I have told you that I understand you, better than nearly any other man you know. I wouldn't be so quick to throw that away over offended pride."

"What happens, then?" Vane asked. "If you know all, if you have seen all, then what happens with me and Eleanor?"

"You killed her father," John said. Vane looked surprised. He took a step away from John and lowered his sword. "You would not listen when she told you who she was, how far she would go to see Nassau prosper. You set yourself up as her enemy, and she used your love for her to steal a treasure out from under you. In revenge you killed her father. She saw you hanged for it."

Vane's eyes were wide, his expression as open as John had ever seen it. John said, "Learn to see others as equals. Eleanor Guthrie may yet be the partner you want, but she may not, and it does no good to be alone in this world."

Vane didn't answer. He went back to sharpening his sword, his movements quick and angry. John looked around but could not spot Muldoon. Dooley, checking knots in the rigging nearby, saw John and reached a hand out for the swab, but John shook his head. It needed to be done, and John was here. Besides, it took his mind off things.

-

Billy found him after breakfast, cleaning dishes while Randall soaked salt pork for lunch. He was looking thoughtful, which was never good news.

Billy asked, "When did you learn how to cook?"

That was not what John had expected. He asked, "How are Vane's men settling in?"

Billy eyed him with clear suspicion, but didn't push. He said, "They're not sailors, that's for certain."

John rolled his eyes. He'd seen one of Vane's crew try to tie a slipknot in the mains'l ropes yesterday; they most definitely were not sailors. "Can they be taught?"

Billy shrugged. "About half want to learn. The other half think they know already. Someone told 'em how glamorous it is to be a pirate, I think."

John thought about his bloody, shattered leg being thrown unceremoniously into the sea, about the stink of a hold full of unwashed men, about the smell of blood and old sweat and gunpowder that followed them out of battle and seemed never to come off. "Who the hell would do that?" he asked.

Billy said, "A man who needs a crew, I'd guess."

John hummed and wiped the last bowl.

Billy leaned against the the kitchen doorway and said, "Vane's crew are all right, now that they've got a steady supply of John Silver stories to keep them in line."

John, reaching for the dirty tureen, stopped with his hands mid-stretch. "I'm sorry, they what?" He hadn't even done anything yet. No shark hunting, no killing Dufresne, no battle for Nassau town, no surviving a near-drowning through luck and bloody-minded desperation.

Billy looked at him. "They're saying the god of the sea visits you in your dreams and gives you visions of the future. They're saying that's why Flint listens to you, when he hasn't listened to anyone since he murdered Mr Gates. They're saying you know how they die and if they cross you, you'll whisper it in their ears as they sleep."

John should have expected something like this and made a plan for how to manage it, but somehow he had not. He gaped at Billy. "That's the stupidest thing I ever heard," he said.

Billy inspected his nails. "It doesn't sound that far-fetched to me. Three days ago, you were happy cowering in the hold while men like Flint threw the bodies of my crew into the mouths of their ambition. Now you're up there doing the throwing."

John had long ago forgotten how to keep his temper. He put down the tureen and marched the few steps across the kitchen, shoving his way into Billy's space and glaring up at him. Billy leaned back and stared down at him.

John put all the pirate king he still had left into his face and his voice. "Listen to me. I have committed to seeing the people of Nassau through the coming invasion by whatever means I have at my disposal. If that means making deals with men who yesterday were my sworn enemies, I will do it. If it means cutting my own fucking leg off, I will do it. And you, who are so proud of your pirate ideals, your all-of-us-are-equal and your these-are-my-brothers, you should not be so quick to dismiss my cause. Because when I say that none of us are free until we all are free, I mean _all of us_ , not just the men you've deemed worthy. That means you too, as much as I hate your fucking face sometimes."

Billy opened his mouth, furious, but didn't say anything. He watched John, jaw working, for a long moment, then he turned and slammed out of the kitchen.

John yanked at his too-short hair. "Fuck," he said. That had not been the plan.

From behind him, Randall said, "That wasn't very nice."

"No," John said. "It wasn't very smart either."

-

John woke the morning of the fourth day after his impossible resurrection feeling soul-sick and weary. He lay in his hammock and watched the ceiling as he swung. He had not realized at the time, but it was markedly apparent to him now, that he had been carried through the last few days by a wave of euphoria - because he wasn't in pain after years and years of it, because his beloved friend and his beloved were still alive, because he was finally back home. But euphoria didn't last, and today John was still the tired, sad old man he had been the day he died. Only now he had planted himself right at the center of a new and much more complicated revolution than the one he had ended all those years ago. What the fuck was he going to do?

It rang five bells, and then six bells. Around him, men stumbled out of their hammocks for shift change. John had to get up and make breakfast. Get up, he told himself.

Muldoon's small, kind face appeared over his hammock. John blinked at him.

Muldoon said something.

John asked, "What?"

Muldoon frowned. "Where are you?" he asked.

"Very far away from here," John said.

Muldoon nodded, looking disturbed, and turned to go. John grabbed his arm.

"Don't go in the hold if it's filling with water," John said. "Send someone else. Not you."

Muldoon watched John for a long moment, and then nodded again. He slipped his arm from John's grasp, and John let him.

An unknown while later, John got up.

-

The whole day was like that. John stared through Randall as Randall was sharing gossip. He had to remind himself of every downstroke of the knife on the chopping block, or he would have stood over a slab of raw fish with his arm raised until the sun grew tired and snuffed itself out. Men of his crew would come up to him, take a look at his face, and scurry away.

At breakfast, Jenks shoved John's shoulder while John was passing out bowls, prompting Dooley, Muldoon and Vincent to stand up with their cutlery gripped tight, and Vane's lifted half out of their seats as well. But John just looked at Jenks, feeling not much of anything. I'm dead, he thought. You can't hurt me again.

After a minute, Jenks gave a disgusted huff and turned away, and everyone went back to their meals.

John went up to the quarter deck after cleanup and looked out at the endless water. He had never learned to enjoy the sea. Today it scraped something inside of him to look at it, but he didn't stop.

Nine bells. Ten bells. Mr Scott joined him on the quarter deck and said, "You are frightening the men."

"I'm none of their fucking business," John said.

Mr Scott said, "You know that is not true."

John said, "Well, then I don't care if I'm frightening them."

Mr Scott said, "You know that is not true either."

John turned to look at Mr Scott, and Mr Scott stared back, impassive. John said, "Today I don't care."

"Be that as it may, you acknowledge your responsibility to this crew and their welfare, and fully one third of them are convinced they are going to die today because you have not smiled or read the Goings On."

Oh, that was right. He hadn't.

John asked, "What do you want me to do about it?"

Mr Scott said, "Go to the kitchens or the captain's cabin and don't come out until you remember that these are your men."

For some reason John could not fathom, he chose Flint's cabin.

Flint looked up from his sea charts as John shut the door. "Oh, it's you," he said.

John walked over to the little bed underneath the window and sat down.

Flint said, "We're making good time. We should be upon the Urca in a few days, three at the most. If nothing has changed from the way you remember it, I imagine we can take the beach with two longboats full of men, and leave the rest to repair the _Walrus_."

John grabbed the blanket at the foot of the bed. It was the same one that had covered his stump, when he had first woken up as half a man. He held it in his hands and looked at it. How had he been able to go on, then? It couldn't just be age. He had two good legs now, and he wanted to lie down and never get up again. After everything he'd done, perhaps that was the best end for him.

Flint turned in the chair to face him, frowning. "What's wrong?" he asked.

John asked, "How did you keep going? All those years, all that heartbreak. Did you ever just want to stop?" The only time John could remember Flint feeling this way, John had dived into the depths after him and pulled him out.

Flint's face changed, the lines of it smoothing out. He leaned forward with his elbows on his knees. "I suppose I did, at times. But I had Miranda, and when I did not," he stopped, looking surprised at himself.

John felt a stirring of something like curiosity. He did not understand Flint's relationship with Mrs Barlow, beyond knowing that Flint loved all his people with passion and fury and devotion. But how did one live with a woman for ten years, when the woman's husband had been his lifeblood? How did two people fill the chasm left by the loss of a third? John asked, "And then?"

Flint said, "A man doesn't have to like the path he is traveling, he just has to walk it. One step, and then the next."

"I'm tired," John admitted. It felt like an extraordinary confession.

"Then sleep," Flint said.

It was easy to do as he said. John lay down on the bed and closed his eyes, and let sleep find him.

He woke sometime later feeling, not vibrant, but not empty either. The angle of light had not changed much; it could not have been long past the afternoon shift change. Flint was at the desk reading a book. When John moved to sit up, Flint glanced up from his book and raised his eyebrows.

John said, "Thank you."

Flint looked down at his book. "Are you in better spirits?" he asked.

John said, "I think I can take a few more steps."

Flint ran his hands over the pages of his book. "That's good, because I've been thinking what our next few steps should be."

"Oh? I thought our next step was to steal the treasure of an empire."

"Before that," Flint said. "I think we need to tell the men that a governor is coming to Nassau. I think we need to tell them before they have the gold in their hands. We need to tell them now." Flint looked up from his book, and the expression on his face was something out of John's memories. He looked at John as if they were partners, and John's heart, squeezed up small in his chest where it couldn't feel and it couldn't ache, started beating faster. A little color came back into the world.

John said, "I think you might be right."

-

"Next item!" John called, and stomped his foot. The crew, even Vane's men, stomped with him. John paused, letting the expectation build. When even Joji started to look tense, he said, "I don't need to tell you that the world is changing. Once we have that gold on our ship, the world will be very different indeed. But the world is changing even more than you might realize, and all of us, every single man, needs to decide, now, who he is, and what happens next."

Another pause. John looked around. They were all waiting for him to give them a path, to tell them who they were. Excitement came roaring up from his chest and spread out to his fingertips, the first thing he had truly felt in hours. He smiled, and he could tell from their faces that it was not a nice smile. "You all know that civilization is coming. It landed at Harbour Island weeks ago and arrested Richard Guthrie. It refused to trade our plunder, and now Nassau is on the brink of starvation. It tortured Billy Bones to convince him to betray his crew. When Billy would not, it tried to bribe him." Billy, standing near the front of the group, glared at John. The men around Billy turned to look at him, curious and wide-eyed and trusting. "When that didn't work," John said, "it moved on to cowards like Robert Maynard and Chaloner Ogle, who have taken the King's Pardon and begun hunting pirates in the Bahamas."

Maynard and Ogle weren't Nassau men. But some on the crews must have heard about them, from Tortuga and Port Royal, because they looked frightened.

John said, "Civilization has a nearly infinite supply of ships, bullets, powder, shot, and men who see us as monsters. When it arrives, neither our crews nor our guns nor our gold will keep it from trying to destroy us. So what can we do?"

John saw Flint step out of the captain's cabin and go to stand against the wheel. He paused, waiting for the men to lean closer. When they did, he said, "We can try to fight, and die for our ideals, for the life of a pirate. But we joined these ships so that we could live. We could leave and go to Spanish Florida, or Havana, and hide or hunt among the Spanish, and wait for Spain to come find us as England has. But running is the coward's way out, and just as I know each of you joined this crew because you are more full of life than any seven Englishmen, I also know you are no cowards. So what can we do?"

The men waited. When John didn't appear likely to answer his own question they began looking at each other.

John said, "There is a third way," and watched them all relax. "Running or fighting, we would be working with their rules. Their war, their story. But we can make our own. Like Henry Avery and Edward Teach before us, we can change the face of the world, make it new. If we make a new path, a smart path, a strong path, a path that England would never think of, we can survive and keep our honor, and never have to apologize for ourselves or our way of life again."

John waited.

Muldoon asked, "What new path?"

John said, "In three months' time, a new governor will arrive in Nassau. He has the authority to offer a King's pardon to every man who has ever sailed under the black. With the gold we're about to steal, we can purchase the estates and businesses on Nassau. We can own the island in all but name. And if we force the crown to accept what we have done, if we make ourselves men in their eyes and not monsters, then we can run the island any way we please, and fuck the governor. When I say we need to make a new path, I mean this: we will build a Republic of Pirates on Nassau, right under their fucking noses."

There was a moment after John said this, like a ship topping the crest of a wave, and then it was chaos.

Billy asked, "They have pardons for all of us?"

De Groot said, "Once we have a new governor, we will have to live by his rules, not ours."

Joshua said, "England needs slaves. I joined this crew so I would never again have to be a slave."

Nicholas said, "You want us to walk on land like cows."

Vincent asked, "So what if we're off the water? Business is business. If I don't have to slaughter a man to get money for my dinner, why would I want to?"

Nicholas said, "In three days I'm going to have more money than King George. I won't ever have to worry about my dinner ever again."

Froom said, "You just called men who took the King's pardon cowards. How's what you want us to do any different?"

Muldoon asked, "You calling Silver a coward?" He shoved himself into Froom's face like a short, angry guard dog.

That was just about enough, John decided. "Gentlemen!" he called, and one by one the men of the crew quieted. He was about to speak again when Muldoon moved.

Muldoon, still looking like a tiny column of rage, came down off his toes and backed away from Froom until he was standing in front of John, facing the men. "You're all so fucking stupid," Muldoon said. "You think he knows how you're going to die, but he doesn't know how to save you? You think he sees everything that goes on in this ship, but he's not seeing exactly the way you can keep your honor and your life? You think he isn't talking to you as a brother? You all can do whatever the fuck you want. I'm following him."

Around him, the men were nodding, frowning, looking at their feet. John had no idea what to say.

Into the quiet, Flint called, "He's right." The crowd turned to him as one. Flint said, "Silver is right. If England sees us as a legitimate threat, it will send every resource it has to wipe us off the face of the Earth. But if it sees us as citizens, it will send fewer men, fewer ships - enough to outfit a governor, not a general. And if we own all the business in town, and the farms, and we are overseeing a thriving merchant trade, the governor will be very wary of trying to tell us where to stand, how to dress, who to fuck, or what we can keep in our own pockets."

"And," John said, "England will be somewhat distracted by the pirate Captain Vane, who will be freeing slaves in the West Indies and the Americas."

The crowd looked at Vane, who had been standing silent at the main mast since John's second item of news. Vane, expressionless, crossed his arms.

Flint said, "England will be doubly distracted when an anonymous agitator starts publishing tracts that advocate for rebellion against English tyranny, to be spread in the colonies." Billy and Vane glanced at each other, and John saw something like understanding pass between them. Flint continued, "In a few months' time, there's going to be so much chaos in the Americas that England will be grateful they can take their eyes away from us, and will leave us to govern ourselves."

John said, "We must give them no reason to put their eye back on us, once it is taken off. The captain and I have a plan for the governor, and for New Providence Island. But we need your help."

Muldoon turned away from the crews and looked at John, an expression of perfect trust on his face. "What do you need me to do?" he asked.

John told him.

-

After that, finding the Urca de Lima was anticlimactic. The rest of the voyage there was quiet, punctuated by crew members coming to John in twos and threes to talk about his and Flint's plan for a Republic. Billy left John alone, and so did Jenks. Flint and Vane even left off their endless bickering. It was about as peaceful a sea voyage as one could have, when one was a pirate.

The wind was good, the weather clear, and they made good time to the coast. Once they sighted land, Flint sent a longboat to row around the spit that was hiding the fucking warship from the Urca, and they reported back that the crew had been reduced to only a tenth of what it had been. For a Spanish galleon, a tenth of their numbers was eight soldiers and nearly forty sailors - a good twenty men more than Nicholas and Vincent had implied remained. Flint frowned at the news.

Dooley, their main scout, said, "They all look sick as dogs, captain, but they ain't dying anytime today." He, Flint, Vane, John and Mr Scott were clustered at the port railing, all of them looking out at the coast as if it would give them answers.

Flint said, "We could fire on them, but they might still have use of their cannons, and if any of them bring the story to St Augustine, we'll have the Spanish on our shores within a week."

"Even with the fucking warship?" Dooley asked.

John said, "They know we took a fucking warship in the first place."

"No," Flint said, "We can give no quarter, not if we're to be safe keeping the money."

Vane said, "My men can go to the beach after nightfall."

"A vanguard?" Mr Scott asked. "Supported by cannon fire, perhaps?"

Flint asked Vane, "How many would you need to subdue an enemy nearly fifty-strong?"

Vane said, "A dozen, if we can figure out a way to signal the gun crews in the dark.”

Flint looked away from the coast, to the combined crew on the deck of their ship. There had been no fighting in recent days, but the men were not cozy with each other by any means. Flint looked at Vane, his eyes narrowed, clearly planning something. John waited.

Flint said, "You and I will go together. Pick five of your best men, I'll pick five of mine. We'll land on either side of the campsite and take out the guards, and then you and I will light flares from the beach to signal the cannons. We can make sure there are no survivors."

Vane watched Flint for a long moment, and then nodded and turned away.

Mr Scott asked, "How did you know that the best way to get him on your side was to offer to kill people together?"

Flint smiled his tall-man smile. "Did I know that?" he asked, and turned away.

-

John was chosen for the vanguard, along with Billy, Joji, Dooley and Joshua. He didn't recognize the men Vane chose. None of them was Jenks.

John got a sword, two knives and three loaded pistols from the stores, as well as a bandolier to carry them. He pulled his hair back away from his forehead, ignoring his shaved face and his lack of jacket. He felt the rush of something huge and unknown coming toward him, the way he'd felt in the moments before their sea battle in the Bay of Nassau. As if this was the moment when the world would change, although he knew not how. He was ready for it.

Flint mixed his men and Vane's on the two longboats. They waited until dusk and then sailed the fucking warship around the hilt spit of land that hid the Urca, keeping all their lanterns and torches snuffed out. When the ship was in position, Flint had the gun crews open the cannon doors, and ordered the vanguard over the side.

On the beach, John could faintly make out figures moving between tents. They had fires going on the sand. Flint ordered his longboat to stop rowing, and they sat hunched low in the dark as, one by one, the men of the Urca left their fires and went to their tents. The night watch was ten strong, and they huddled together in front of the central camp fire, leaving one man to walk the perimeter as a guard.

Flint leaned over to whisper to Billy, "Row to the other side of the Urca. We land there."

Billy nodded and passed the order down.

They pulled their longboat up onto the beach and crept around the Urca. Up close, it was a behemoth, larger even than the fucking warship, and it stank of rotting wood and rotting bodies. The vanguard had to step carefully, to avoid stumbling over any gold pieces and giving their location away. On the other side of the ship, John could see the campsite and the guard, and beyond that a faint shiver in the darkness as Vane and the rest of the men crept up from the other side of the camp.

The guard wandered toward John, humming something. He was weaving slightly as he walked, clearly tipsy. John waited until the man saw him in the shadow of the Urca, and then lept forward and slit the man's throat. It was the first time he had killed since coming back, and all of it - the blood, the wet gasping sounds, the stillness - was easy.

Farther along the beach, John heard a muffled yell as Vane's men rushed the watch around the fire. John saw Flint run into a tent, and heard a scream from inside, quickly cut short. Billy followed Flint inside, while one of Vane's crew that had been with them on the longboat grabbed a doused torch from the side of the tent, ran to light it in the fire, and then stuck it in the sand out front of another tent.

John heard the sound of cannon fire and a sharp whistling noise, and the tent in front of him exploded.

The rest of the men of the Urca came rushing out of the other tents. John pulled out a pistol and shot at a soldier who was charging at Vane. Another man, a sailor, ran toward John and was cut down from behind by one of Vane's men.

Joji went to light another torch, and he threw it at a cluster of Urca men, who backed away in a group. The fucking warship fired another cannon shot, and the group of Urca men was gone.

John saw a shadow come rushing out of the darkness, and he lifted his sword on instinct. The shadow became a Spanish soldier, who brought his sword down on John's with a crash. John twisted his wrist to turn the sword away, unsheathed a knife and shoved it between the man's ribs. Another Urca man came at him, screaming. John cut him down. Another, another. John heard the sound of cannon fire.

By all rights, he should not have noticed. John was caught up in the pulse of battle. He was back-to-back with Joshua, facing the ocean, and he should not have seen anything amiss. But somehow he became aware of an Urca man who was running toward Flint and Billy with a lit torch it held high over his head.

John yelled, "No!" He ran up the beach after the Urca man. If he was too late, if Flint or Billy was lost, this would all have been for nothing. When the man stopped to throw the torch, John drove his sword through the man's back. The torch fell to the sand at his feet.

John heard a boom, and that same loud whistling sound. The ground below him exploded in a spray of sand and blood. John screamed, and only after he screamed did he realize something was very wrong. He fell on his stomach. Around him, men were fighting for their lives. He was in so much pain he couldn't breathe. There was something wrong with his leg. Please not again, he thought.

The world went dark.

-

John woke on the beach to the smell of burning flesh and a feeling like his leg was on fire. He screamed again.

"Somebody hold him down!" A voice called.

John felt hands at his shoulders, shoving him down. "Stop," he said.

"I'm sorry," the voice said, "I'm sorry. We have to stop the bleeding or you'll die before we get you to Howell."

John didn't understand. Howell was dead. John was dead. Why did everything hurt when he was already dead?

"You saved my life," the voice said. "I won't forget."

John closed his eyes.

-

He woke in the hold of the fucking warship. It took him a moment to remember where he was, but he knew that dirty ceiling and the smell of blood. Billy was standing over him, and Flint, and Howell with his leather satchel full of dirty knives. Behind them was the crew of the _Walrus_ , all watching in silence.

John knew this memory. He didn't like it.

"No," he said.

Howell said, "I have to remove the leg. It's too damaged."

John said, "Not again. Please not again." It hurt to speak.

Howell looked at Billy, who shook his head. Howell unrolled the satchel.

John said, "I already lived through it once. Please don't."

There was a pause. Then Howell said, "Be that as it may, if I don't remove the leg you won't be living at all."

John whimpered. 

Billy leaned over him. "Hey, Silver. I'll be right here the whole time. You took care of me, you saved me. It's my turn."

John sighed. He was too tired to fight them. "Wash your knives," he said.

"What?" Howell asked.

"Do it," Flint said. "Do as he says."

"Oh," John said. "You're here." That was different.

Flint said something, but John didn't hear. He lost consciousness between one breath and the next.

-

When he awoke again it was daylight. His leg hurt and his body hurt and his heart hurt. He was lying on Flint's bed in the cabin of the fucking warship, down one foot, again. It was all happening again. John gasped, covered his face, and started to cry.

He heard a rustling from the desk.

"You should try to rest," Flint's hesitant voice said. "Howell says you should sleep for another few days while your body heals."

The words didn't make sense. John felt like he was in a haze of pain and memories. He knew what came next and he didn't want it. Long John Silver, the war, Madi's imprisonment, the treasure. Flint's body in a hole in the ground, Madi's body lost to the sea. John had thought he could stop it, but you couldn't stop the horrors of the world. He had forgotten. He had foolishly hoped.

Flint said, "John. Breathe. Drink some water."

John choked, tried to breathe. He dug the heels of his hands into his eyes. He wanted to roll over and hide his face, but it hurt too much to move. "Fuck," he said. "Captain."

"I'm here," Flint said.

John said, "Promise me."

Flint asked, "What shall I promise?"

"Promise me you'll stop me," John said. Suddenly, it seemed vitally important that he have Flint's promise. He took his hands away from his face and opened his eyes. Flint was standing over him in shirtsleeves, one hand holding a book, looking worried and uncharacteristically gentle.

"Stop you from what?" Flint asked.

John reached out and grabbed Flint's arm. "Promise me. You must live. Madi must live. If I'm to become _him_ again, you have to promise you'll stop me." It couldn't happen again, not like it had the last time. John felt a howling grief in his chest, at the thought of those long nightmare months playing out the way they had before. He couldn't let that happen. Flint had to make sure.

Flint said, "I don't understand."

John said, "Watch me, don't let me plan. Make sure." He squeezed his eyes shut and felt more tears leak out. He didn't remember what he had been saying. Why did everything hurt? His stump had been healed for years. What was wrong with him?

Flint said, "I promise. I'll make sure, but you must rest."

John felt a hand take his, removing it from the arm he gripped and setting it back on his chest. A hand smoothed the hair off his forehead. The cool skin felt like heaven against his feverish skin. He sighed. He slept.

-

The men visited him in twos and threes. They had not voted him quartermaster this time, a fact that John absorbed with equal parts relief and disappointment, but they still cared what he had to say. John stayed on the little bed in the captain's cabin, and he was visited in the daytime. At night he was alone with his pain and his thoughts. He didn't know where Flint slept.

They stopped in Tortuga and Port Royal. They stopped at Nevis, St Kitts, Martinique. Dufresne, sadly still alive, had frantically counted every real, escudo and doubloon they had managed to squeeze into the newly-repaired _Walrus_ and the fucking warship, and determined that each man here now had forty-three thousand, two hundred sixty dollars to his name. That was a lot of trading to be done.

They bought whale oil and fabric. They traded for gems and pearls. They bought tobacco and sugar. Then they began buying supplies for the new republic, to re-stock the warehouses and build new homes. Flour, lumber and iron, livestock, seed for crops.

At John's insistence they bought two broken-down sloops, barely sea-worthy. When asked why, John responded that they needed the hold space. He did not say that, one day, they might need to be scuttled in the harbor.

It took weeks, while John mostly slept and sometimes cried, and listened when the men came to him with their hopes and their doubts. Every time he encouraged someone, he promised himself that he was building a new story. Every time he reassured someone, he told himself that Long John Silver was gone, a forgotten king of a forgotten time.

He and Flint occupied the captain's cabin in the daytime, John with his bloody, bandaged leg and his visitors, Flint with his sea charts. They did not speak.

-

Finally, when they had exchanged enough of the Urca gold in enough locations that tracking it all would be the work of months, or even years, they pointed their prow toward home. John heard reports from Muldoon and Dobbs that Captain Vane and his men had bought the fucking warship from Flint's crew with a portion of their shares, to be delivered upon their arrival at Nassau. He heard reports that Captain Vane and Captain Flint had offered each of the men a choice: fight to free the slaves of the New World with Vane, or stay and build a republic. Joji had joined Captain Vane, as had Dufresne, De Groot and Beauclerc. A good number of Vane's men had elected to stay and help build the republic. Muldoon told John that Vane was planning to name the fucking warship the _Slave's Revenge_. John supposed that subtlety, in this case, was neither needed nor desired.

The world was changing around them. Not with violence, but with votes, commerce, and the dream of a better life. He was too tired from the loss of his leg to feel much of anything, but underneath the blankness and the grief, John imagined he felt a stirring of excitement. When they arrived back on Nassau, it would be to something entirely new. That was worth sacrificing for, he told himself.

John had two odd visits after they dropped anchor in the Bay. The first was from Billy, who ducked into the captain's cabin as Flint and De Groot called orders outside, and men rushed around retying rope and rolling sails, preparing to hand over the _Slave's Revenge_ to her new captain. John could sit up comfortably now, and when he saw Billy he pulled himself upright and waved to a chair. 

Billy slowly pulled the desk chair over near John's bed and sat. He looked at the floor, then back at John. He cleared his throat. "Flint came to speak with me yesterday. Said he's stepping down as captain when we arrive in Nassau, and he's going to offer my name for a vote as replacement."

Although he and Flint hadn't spoken about this, John wasn't surprised. He said, "Good. You're a leader and they love you. You'll take care of your crew."

Billy's shoulders came down and his expression eased, and only then did John realize he'd been worried. It was a strange feeling, to know that Billy once again cared what he thought.

"Flint also said that he wanted to hire my crew, to scout for Captain Vane," Billy continued. "Said a ship like the _Walrus_ can visit any port in the Americas but a fucking warship can't, and Vane might need a consort to help him ferry freed slaves back to Nassau." Billy frowned. "I don't think he's told Captain Vane any of this."

John snorted.

Billy said, "And I've no idea what he thinks he's going to pay us, seeing as how we all have equal shares."

John found himself grinning. "That clever bastard," he said. "That masterful fucker."

Billy frowned. "What, you think he's tricking us somehow?"

John shook his head. He said, "I think it is one thing to say you're going to build a nation of hunters, but it is another thing entirely to give those hunters a role to play, and an identity, that is part of that new nation."

Billy said, "You already gave us a role. Remember that speech you made, when Muldoon almost bit Froom's throat out?"

"No," John said. "I gave you a plan. I gave you a story. But I didn't give you a job to do, to make that story into a reality. Flint's done that. It isn't trickery, not any kind you're thinking of. The only thing Flint has tricked you into is trading the name of pirate for the name of savior."

Billy leaned forward, elbows on his knees, looking intent. "You understand him better than anybody else I've known. Better than Gates."

John tipped his head.

Billy said, "Tell me this. Can we trust him? Can we trust that this, giving up his captaincy, moving to the interior, the pamphlets, the slaves, all of it, that it's not just another grab at tyrannical rule over all of us?"

If Billy had asked that question of John years ago, on Skeleton Island or in the terrible months before it, John would have said no. What Flint had made himself into after Mrs Barlow's murder, that man would have sacrificed anything to feed his vengeance. But the man John was allowing Flint to become, that man needed allies, and trust. That man needed a different story.

John allowed himself to laugh. "How?" he asked. "You'll be on the water and he'll be on a farm somewhere."

Billy said, "He'll be living in the center of the new life for piracy in the West Indies."

"Yes, and he will be busy making it all work."

Billy crossed his arms. "Just tell me, Silver. Please."

John sighed. "That's what you never understood, Billy. If he could have found any other way to get what he wanted, he would have given up his captaincy years ago."

Billy sat with that for a minute. Around them, the ship creaked and groaned. Soon John would get to leave it, and he would have to find a new life for himself on land. The future would be a mystery again.

"What does he want?" Billy asked.

But the future wasn't a nightmare.

"He wants the man he loves," John said. "He wants the woman he makes a home with. He wants those pamphlets you said you'd write. He wants a self-governing, peaceful Nassau. He wants an England that will look at us and realize what a wretched, terrifying mistake it made the day it threw us all away." John shrugged. "Admittedly, that one might require a little violence, but he's handed that work off to you and Vane, and you have accepted it. Flint thought he was alone in his goals. He thought he could only buy these things with his captaincy, could only barter with his own soul. But we have all found a new way."

Billy looked unconvinced.

"You'll see," John said. If Mrs Barlow lived, if Thomas lived, if Woodes Rogers never gained a foothold and Billy was never pitted against the Underhill slaves, they would surely have a better outcome than the one he remembered. Flint would illuminate the dark not with a city on fire, but with a million tiny points of stars.

Billy said, "I suppose I will," and stood to go.

When he was nearly at the door, John called, "Billy."

Billy turned back.

John thought about Julius, for the first time in years. He thought about the burns on a woman's back, a fragile alliance, having to weigh his loyalties when every choice was wrong. He said, "Remember that we are a nation now. Every citizen is important, not just your crew. If we are to build this, then every soul must have the same worth. And congratulations, captain."

Billy watched John for a long moment, and then nodded to him and left.

The second visit was from Flint. They had arrived in the early morning, and by mid-afternoon they were ready to send out the first longboat. John heard the splash as it was lowered into the water, and the clunk of feet on the ladder. The ship was anchored with the starboard side facing the harbor, so when John looked out the window above his bed he could just see Fort Nassau and the tops of some of the buildings in town. He was gazing idly at the ocean and the palm trees, and wishing for a bath, when Flint slammed into the captain's cabin, looking frantic.

"Captain? What's wrong?" John asked, sitting up straight. He looked around for his sword.

Flint stared at John, eyes huge. He said, "Come with me."

"What? Captain, if you'll remember my leg -"

"I'll fucking carry you," Flint snapped.

John grabbed the edge of the bed under his knee. "If you try I will cut your fucking arms off."

Flint yanked at his hair, pulling it out of its tie. "Just - come out to the railing. I have to show you something. I need to show you."

John, baffled, lifted his left arm. Flint came and grabbed it and hauled it over his shoulder. They made a strange three-legged creature, galumping out onto the deck. It was the first time John had left the cabin in weeks, and everything was overwhelming. The light was painfully bright, the sound of the ship too loud, the smell of the air sweet and rich after too long with the smell of his bandages and salt-crusted clothing. Around them, men stopped and watched, and John thought perhaps he should have tried this earlier.

Flint walked them to the starboard railing and pointed to the beach. "There," he said.

John looked. At first it was too bright for him to make out anything at all, but then his eyes adjusted and he saw. There were two figures standing at the edge of the jetty. One was short and brown-haired, wearing a pale dress. One was tall and fair-haired and clothed in bright colors. Thomas and Miranda Hamilton were there, waiting for their Lieutenant.

Lord fucking bless Anne Bonny.

"Captain," John said. He found himself smiling. There was a bubble of happiness under his ribs that grew larger with every moment. He had made it right, finally.

Flint grabbed the wrist John had slung over his shoulder, squeezing so tight it hurt. He was breathing hard. John frowned.

"What the fuck are you doing? Why are you still here?" John asked. He pulled the arm Flint was holding and shook it around. Flint turned to stare at him, looking shocked and terrified. That wasn't right. "Get on a longboat and go to them."

Flint shook his head. "He's here. You were right. He's alive."

Oh, God. "You didn't believe me, did you?" John asked. "No, of course you didn't, even after all we've accomplished together. You would rather gamble everything on a lie than trust that someone was telling you the truth." He shook his head. "Captain. Whatever crisis you are having right now is wasting your time. Get off this ship, get on that boat, and go to them."

Flint took a deep breath, and then another. "James," he said.

"What?"

Flint let go of John's wrist, and then pressed John's hand between both of his. John was struck by how gentle the touch was. It had been so long since anyone had touched him with gentleness. He hadn't thought Flint capable of it.

Flint looked at John's hand and said, "You have given him back to me. I believe that you were speaking the truth about Peter Ashe, and that Miranda would have been killed if we had journeyed to Charles Town. So I know that you have given them both back to me. You must call me James."

John twitched his fingers in James's grasp, not to escape, but to feel the shift of muscle and bone in James's hands. He said, "James, get in that fucking longboat."

James squeezed John's hand tighter. He still wouldn't look at John.

John said, "Go now."

James brought his clasped hands, with John's trapped between them, to his mouth. Then he unslung John's arm from his shoulder, and brought it to rest on the starboard railing. He walked to the stair, stepped over, and climbed down to the longboat.

John watched the longboat make its slow way to the beach. Around him, men bustled and worked. John would have to figure out a way to get back to his bed in the captain's cabin. He would, he supposed, have to actually listen when Howell talked about exercise, and what work he could do to strengthen his body again. But that could wait.

John watched the longboat arrive at the beach. He watched the men disembark until only James was left. He watched James stand up, slowly and carefully. He watched Thomas Hamilton reach an arm down, and pull James up onto the jetty. He watched James touch his forehead to Miranda's. And then he watched as James reached up and embraced Thomas and kissed him, there in broad daylight in front of all the men and women of Nassau, at the start of the new world they were going to build together.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In this chapter, John kills multiple soldiers while taking the Urca treasure. Most of the violence is vaguely described, but there are some details. Also, John's leg gets blown off by friendly fire from the warship, and the story describes his pain and the aftermath of surgery.
> 
> The line, "You two would be much better as friends than as rivals" is remixed from John's line in the show, during his shark-hunting date with Flint.
> 
> John's line, "When I say that none of us are free until we all are free, I mean all of us" is remixed from Billy's speech to Dufresne upon kicking him off the _Walrus_ crew. I love that line, and I imagine it would have stuck in John's memory.
> 
> Re: washing knives before surgery, and John's insistence on Howell cleaning his tools. In reality, doctors didn't make the connection between dirt and infection until 1846, so this is entirely creative license. I am super squeamish about stuff like unwashed surgical tools (I blame _Dirty Dancing_ ), so this story exists in an alternate universe where some doctor figured out the connection between doctors touching cadavers and then going to deliver babies without washing their hands, and the huge number of women and babies dying of childbed fever, in like 1730 or something. Sorry, Dr Semmelweis.


	4. The Republic of Pirates

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _John felt like tearing his hair from his scalp. He wished he had two working legs so he could kick James in the face with one of them and kick himself in the ass with the other._
> 
> \--
> 
> Being The Account Of How Mr Scott, Max, James, Eleanor, Miranda, Thomas And A Passel Of Obstreperous Pirates Worked To Make Nassau The Utopia That Was Promised, While Mr John Silver Sat And Watched And Didn't Touch A Fucking Thing - As The Gods Intended.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I LIVE.
> 
> This chapter has been sitting on my laptop for nearly a year, and I am finally posting it whether it is ready or not. I have been getting the most amazing feedback from people, even though this is a WIP and it's been getting dustier every day. You guys are wonderful, and you're the reason I am back to writing again. This will get finished or I will die trying. In the meantime, enjoy!

John thought he would have more time before the work began again. A day, certainly, for James to spend with the ones he loved. Perhaps more, as the supplies were unloaded and the gems moved to the fort. Some time before John had to determine his new role here, and re-learn how to walk one-legged on sand. But in reality, he was given less than an hour.

John stayed out on the deck after he saw James and Lord and Lady Hamilton disappeared from the beach. Then he turned his eyes to the water, the ships in the harbor, the buildings, the fort. The beauty of this place had long ago ceased to astonish him, and then Nassau had become an idea, a political tool, the hinge point of their world. But after years in England he was still not used to being back again. The richness of the colors and the warmth of the air were a delight.

John was still gazing at the beach when three small figures emerged from the bustle of sand merchants and sailors. They were noticeable for the skirts they were wearing, and for the straight line they walked from the town to the jetty. Two were dark-haired and wore pale dresses, and the third was yellow-haired with a dark dress. John frowned, then squinted, then swore.

John watched as Eleanor Guthrie, Miranda Hamilton and Max walked to the edge of the jetty, were handed into a boat, and were rowed to the _Slave's Revenge_.

-

Lady Hamilton settled onto the bed in the captain's cabin easily, with no apparent discomfort, as if she were hosted in the sleeping quarters of Spanish warships every day. Eleanor Guthrie sat next to her, looking around as if she were assessing it for sale. Max stood next to the bed, with Lady Hamilton between her and Eleanor.

John, having been given a crutch by Howell to stump around the ship, used it to maneuver himself into the chair by the desk. He said, "I'm afraid I've nothing but rum to offer you."

Lady Hamilton smiled at him. There was a joy about her, a brightness in her eyes and a lift in her chin, that John didn't remember ever having seen before. Thomas Hamilton's return suited her, he thought. She said, "That would be lovely, thank you."

John started, and then looked around to see if he did in fact have rum to offer. There was a bottle over by the bookshelf, and two mugs. He lurched up and swung himself around, twisting past the desk. It had been easy to remember how to walk with one leg. He grabbed the bottle, and hooked the handles of the mugs with his left hand, holding it and the crutch, and lurched back. As he sat, he noticed Eleanor Guthrie staring at the place where his leg ended. Her expression was unreadable. Lady Hamilton and Max both watched his face the entire time. John asked, "Miss Guthrie?" and lifted the mugs.

Eleanor shook her head. "No, thank you."

"Max?"

Max said, "Thank you, yes."

John poured for Lady Hamilton and Max, and kept the bottle for himself.

Lady Hamilton lifted her mug to him, and drank. "I was very sorry to hear of your injury," she said.

John still could not look at his leg without wanting to weep. He said, "So was I."

Lady Hamilton said, "I must admit, when I heard of it I wondered if this was one of those things that you knew was coming. You know so much else, after all."

John raised his eyebrows. "This has happened to me before, yes." He leaned forward. "What are you saying? And why are you saying it to me?"

Lady Hamilton took another drink from her mug. There was something else that was different about her, a crackle of dangerous energy that John could sense but not see. He had the feeling that a wave was about to crash over his head, although what it was and where it would leave him, he did not know. He told himself that, whatever descended, the futures of those he loved were secure. He tightened his grip on his mug.

Lady Hamilton said, "I am ashamed to admit that it took me several days to begin asking questions. You and James were already gone, so I found others who had the same questions as I." At this, she motioned to Max and Eleanor. "Do you know what those questions were?"

John said, "I am sure you'll tell me."

"Why were you so moved by the sight of the captain?" Max asked.

"How did you know about Thomas?" Lady Hamilton asked.

"Why were you so desperate to see events turn out differently than they had before?" Eleanor asked.

John stared at them. They watched him back, for all the world like the Three Fates examining the thread of his life, ready to make the cut. "You all have become quite good friends while I was away," he said.

Lady Hamilton said, "It has been a very long time since I had true companions, Mr Silver. When I discovered kindred spirits in Max and Eleanor, I knew I had to take a page from your book: Complete transparency and honesty with one's partners."

John tried again. "Lady Hamilton, is it not enough that I wanted to prevent your death, and the chaos and bloodshed that would follow?"

"Perhaps," Lady Hamilton said.

"Perhaps not," Eleanor said.

"We think there is more you have yet to reveal," Max said.

"And the more we discussed it," Lady Hamilton said, "the more my friends and I felt it was critical for you to tell me what you know that makes you so dangerous to my James."

John swallowed. He realized that his shoulders were hunched, and uncurled them. "And them?" he asked, tilting his head toward Eleanor. "Why are they here?"

"We believe you have stories for us as well," Max said. "It is a rare woman who would not wish to know her fate, so that she may have the power to prevent it."

Lady Hamilton leaned forward, the handle of the mug dangling from her hand. "I have come to make you a deal, Mr Silver. I, and I alone, have a choice to make regarding the future of this place. Since it involves some danger to myself, and you have declared your investment in my safety, I will give you the opportunity to influence that choice. In exchange, I want you to tell me what you did to him."

"No," John said, and then, "I have told you everything."

"Clearly not," Max said.

"Everything I can bear to tell," John tried.

Lady Hamilton said, "And what will you force me to bear, Mr Silver?"

John did not have an answer.

He had known, since he had spoken to Mrs Barlow in the Guthrie parlor all those week ago, that if anyone would be the deliverance of his dear friend, it would be her. He had thought he had given her the tools to do so, but perhaps he had not given her enough. Perhaps nothing would be enough, except everything. He felt the wave crash over him, and he allowed himself to welcome it. "You have a deal," he said. He drank from his bottle.

"Splendid." Lady Hamilton smiled. She leaned back until she was almost lounging on the bed, and said, "First I will tell you that Thomas and I have been discussing your Woodes Rogers problem."

John raised his eyebrows. "What was the nature of this discussion?"

"My husband used to be a firm believer in man's fundamental goodness. As you can imagine, he has experienced a change of heart in the last several years. So when I told him the story you told me, of a man so determined to rule that he called the Spanish Navy down on New Providence Island to raze it to the ground, Thomas was understandably concerned. And once I further informed him that the nature of Governor Rogers's downfall was his myriad debts, Thomas agreed with my proposed solution."

"Which is?" 

Lady Hamilton said, "That we need to be his creditors. Especially now. If we can keep him from borrowing from the Spanish, he will have no investment in chasing down the Urca gold."

"And if we hold the purse strings," Eleanor said, "We can send him to debtor's prison any time we choose."

John asked, "With what money? We certainly can't buy him with our jewels and barrels of tobacco. I don't care how well we think we've hidden their origins."

Max said, "With Eleanor's grandfather's money."

"Grandmother's," John corrected her. He enjoyed the look of surprise on Max's face, and Eleanor's.

"And," Lady Hamilton said, looking satisfied, "with Peter Ashe's money."

John stared at her. "No."

Lady Hamilton said, "I had hoped for a more reasoned argument."

"Did I not tell you the results of walking into Peter Ashe's house? What part of _you will die_ is an unreasonable argument?"

The smile fell off of Lady Hamilton's face. She said, "You have told me that my sudden anger provoked his bodyguard. Well, I have been angry all these weeks. There is nothing sudden about it anymore."

John said, "I have also told you that Peter Ashe has no investment in your safety."

"He will if I come transporting his beloved daughter."

"He will _not_ ," John said. "I know this because you were transporting his beloved daughter the last time. Lady Hamilton, when I tell you this is dangerous, I am not guessing. I lived it."

Lady Hamilton said, "His beloved daughter who has volunteered, without coercion on the part of myself or Thomas, to request an audience with her father aboard our ship, alone, so that she can plead our case for us." She looked down, jaw working. "I understand the danger. This is why I am asking you to tell me everything you remember about our time in Charles Town. If you can steer us away from ruin through your knowledge of what once happened, then it is possible I can do the same."

John shook his head. "Do you know what it will do to him if you're wrong?"

Lady Hamilton looked straight into his eyes. "Yes," she said.

"And why Peter Ashe?" John asked. "Would it not be enough to have Marion Guthrie's money?"

Eleanor cleared her throat. "I am told that it was my death that convinced my grandfa - my grandmother to buy up Governor Rogers's debts." Lady Hamilton laid a hand over Eleanor's. "We all know that death changes the hearts of the living. I can't be sure a live granddaughter would the same effect, and we need to be sure. Giving the Guthrie family leverage with the governor of Carolina . . ."

"Especially," Lady Hamilton said, glancing at Eleanor, "if that financial leverage is paired with a scandalous story, of a man betraying his closest friends in exchange for a bribe the size of a colony. I don't think any canny businesswoman would be able to resist an opportunity like that."

John, impressed, said, "Lady Hamilton. Miss Guthrie. I am very deeply grieved that I did not have the chance to work with you before this." Max raised her eyebrows and pursed her lips, but did not speak.

Lady Hamilton said, "You have the chance right now."

John took a breath. He gathered his thoughts. He said, "The man who killed you is Colonel William Rhett, but Peter Ashe is too weak-willed to hold his leash. You need to circumvent any opportunity Rhett might have to see you as a threat. Ask Ashe to bring the Colonel to your ship, so he isn't at the jetty manning a cannon. Keep him on the deck as you take Ashe into the captain's cabin. Do not let Ashe take Abigail from your ship himself, but instead send her on a longboat rowed by one of Ashe's infantrymen, when the ship is nearly out of the harbor again." He spread his hands. There.

"This is helpful, but incomplete. What happened?" Lady Hamilton asked.

"Colonel Rhett shot you," John said.

"What happened?"

John said, "Colonel Rhett saw you as a threat and killed you."

Lady Hamilton asked, "What happened in Charles Town?"

John clenched his teeth. The story of this had once been branded on his mind; the moment Flint descended. It was easy to call it up, although he hated to recount it. "You were both so hopeful. I could see him, returning to the Lieutenant you knew. The closer we got to Charles Town, the softer he became. You, mum, you were convinced there was a future for Nassau that could be bought with a good deed and a little begging. Ashe allowed you into his home. He made you recount the story of the _Maria Alleyne_. He lectured you on morality." John sneered. "On decency. He allowed himself to be convinced that you were the people he remembered. He said he could find the voted for a universal pardon if Flint went to London to confess his affair with Thomas. Ashe said it would show that pirates are men who have strayed from the path of goodness, not monsters. Flint was willing. It would have worked. Understand me, Lady Hamilton, _you thought it could have worked_. And then you noticed the clock."

Lady Hamilton had been watching him with her bright, fierce eyes. At this, she bit her lip and looked down.

John said, "You recognized it. You understood what bargain must have been struck. You asked Peter when his confession would be, for destroying your family in return for a bribe. I believe, after ten years and unimaginable loss, that this was the moment your heart broke. You said you wanted Charles Town to burn. You said you wanted Ashe dead. You said you wanted to kill him yourself. And Rhett shot you."

Lady Hamilton was silent. Eleanor had a look of compassion that John had never seem from her before. Max was staring at her folded hands.

"There's more," John said. "At James's - Flint's - trial, they showed your body in the square. You were made spectacle, as the minion of a fearsome pirate. Flint told me, once, that that was the moment Charles Town was condemned. Before that, Ashe would have paid, maybe the magistrates. After that, everyone had to pay. And Ashe did nothing. He is a coward, and he allows other men to use civilization as the knife that slices people to ribbons. When you face him, understand that he will never be moved by respect, or loyalty, or the rules of engagement."

Lady Hamilton stared past John. Her smile was gone, her glow was gone. The bright crackling sense of danger remained.

John said, "Tell me you understand how dangerous this is. Tell me you are not so enraged that you will not be careful."

Lady Hamilton looked at him. She said, "I understand, and I will be careful. Now please, the rest of it."

"Excuse me?" John asked. He hadn't recovered from the last confession, and she wanted this next? "Don't you want a moment to -"

"If you please. Miss Guthrie's story, Max's and yours, as promised."

John looked down. It was the first time he had let his eyes rest on his leg since he had woken up. There was still a chance he would become Long John Silver. He had all the pieces. And perhaps, this time, it would play out differently enough that he wouldn't notice, with only the result remaining the same. Flint dead, Madi dead, John alone in the world. Perhaps, he thought, Lady Hamilton would not only be James's deliverance. She might just be John's as well.

"Well, if we're doing this, we're all going to need more rum." He poured for Lady Hamilton and Max, and drank more himself. He pointed to Max. "We'll start with you," he said. Then he told them nearly everything.

-

The day after Lady Hamilton and Eleanor Guthrie's visit, there was a vote to name the new captain of the _Walrus_. No one was beaten to death, no one was hanged afterward. James merely made his announcement, and offered his still-baffled candidate. The vote was nearly unanimous.

After that came the strange work of rearranging the crews. In John's experience, it was not uncommon for crews to split and men to declare their loyalty to new captains, or no captain at all. However, to have it done peacefully, calmly, and with discussion and respect for all parties, was a new thing. John was invited to resolve arguments up and down the length of the _Slave's Revenge_ , giving him good practice with his crutches and taking his mind off of Lady Hamilton's white-lipped face and her tears.

Then came the unloading of provisions and pearls, the former to the Guthrie storehouses and the latter to the fort. Captain Hornigold was still a problem that would have to be dealt with, John thought, and definitely before Woodes Rogers arrived, but for now Hornigold seemed content with an oversized payment in exchange for allowing the Billy's and Vane's men to post guards on the treasure.

The men came to John again, this time to reassure him that the percentages of their shares that they had promised to the new republic would be honored. They had it documented with Dufresne, they said. Didn't need that much money anyway, they said, not and lose Nassau to the fucking English. John thanked each and every one of them, heart full. He said goodbye to each and every one of them.

And then it was time for John to leave.

It was easy. John didn't own much, and what he did own was easily carried. It was the work of minutes to pack and leave the captain's cabin behind. Getting from the deck to the longboat took longer, but John had practice and nobody was shooting cannons at him, so he made it in one piece. The only other passenger this time was Mr Scott.

John looked at him sideways.

Mr Scott was gazing out at the water, looking calm and serene, and didn't look at John. John allowed himself to relax.

Halfway to the jetty, Mr Scott said, "I am writing articles."

John tensed, then forced himself to relax. He turned to Mr Scott. "Excuse me?"

"For the estates. You told me you did not know how they were to be run. I have lived in Boston, in London, in Nassau, on pirate ships, on my wife's island, and in the village where I was born. I have seen many kinds of government. The people of the estates will vote for leaders, and receive shares. They will sign articles that will allow them to determine their own futures. This is the world my daughter will inherit."

John could not answer. There was something in his throat, an emotion too large for him to speak around it.

Mr Scott looked at the jetty again. "I have asked myself many times in the last weeks, why it was that you thought of this solution and not I."

John cleared his throat. "You had a solution," he said. The emotion was still there, but he shoved it down. "In many ways, it is a better solution than the one I offered. Here your people are exposed, and they depend upon a republic that may or may not survive its infancy. Dependent upon men who have never been slaves, and don't understand." He could almost remember Madi's voice as he said this. "The only advantage my plan has is that it is self-sustaining, and we now have the money to pull it off."

Mr Scott was quiet for a moment. The jetty came closer. "Then I asked myself, had I already thought of it? One of those nights when I lay in chains, had I dreamed of such a paradise as the one we are creating? And had I stamped out the dream myself, to save myself from the pain of having it torn out of me?"

John had no answer.

Mr Scott shook his head. "One of the many tragedies of slavery, Mr Silver, is the cages it forces us to build inside our own minds. I have tried to see my daughter raised without these cages -"

"She is," John said, and then bit his lip.

Mr Scott said, quietly, "You have met her."

"Yes," John said.

Mr Scott said, "It has been many years since I have seen my wife and daughter."

"It has been many years for me as well," John said. He felt as if something was clawing its way out of his chest. "But when I knew her, she was free. Her heart and her mind were free."

Mr Scott was quiet until they reached the jetty. Then he turned to John and said, "Thank you."

-

James found him two days later. John had taken a room at the inn, which he tried to stay away from as much as possible. Having no crew, and therefore no work, it was a struggle to fill his days - the first time in decades that he had absolutely nothing to do. With James, Mr Scott and the others building the republic, John made sure to keep clear of the Guthrie tavern and the governor's mansion, and instead he set about re-learning the back streets of Nassau from the slightly tilted vantage point of walking bent over a crutch.

This day, John stayed out until well after dark, enjoying the velvety warmth of the air and the view of stars between the rooftops. When his armpit hurt too much to keep going, he stumped back into the inn, past the patrons and up the stairs. Tonight the musicians didn't stop playing when they saw him, and the patrons all kept their staring to a minimum. It was, he supposed, the best he could hope for.

John had only just sat down at the table in his room, when there was a knock at the door. He sent a quick prayer to the God he did not believe in that it would be anyone other than James, but he wasn't hopeful. This conversation was coming, whether he was prepared for it or not. He called, "Enter."

The James who stepped into his room was as different from the man who had left John behind on the _Slave's Revenge_ as it was possible to be. His beard was the same, his clothes were the same, but it seemed as if some piece of his heart had been returned to him. He looked around the room with an open curiosity in his face, and John found he had to look away from it.

After a minute, James said, "Miranda has left for Carolina with Abigail Ashe. Before she went, I told her I was going to visit you."

John said, "I was led to believe that Lady Hamilton forbade you from visiting me." He was happy that his voice sounded even.

James looked at him sideways. "Miranda can request, and I will respect her need to see me safe. But she and I do not order each other, or forbid each other."

Even James's voice was different. It set John's teeth on edge, to hear that gentleness and the ease in it. John asked, "How much did she tell you?"

"Everything you told her," James said. He began walking around the edge of the room, examining the walls and the windows and the floor. He acted like a man who had been blinded for years, who suddenly had the return of his faculties and wanted to to take in everything he had missed for so long. James even reached out to touch the mirror hung on John's wall with careful fingertips.

"And?" John asked.

"And what?"

" _And_ ," John said, getting angry, "What has possessed you to walk into the room of the man that you now know brought about your ruin and your death?"

James turned to face him. "Alfred Hamilton and Peter Ashe brought about my ruin. I brought about my own ruin. And if I held it against every man who tried to kill me, I would have very few friends indeed." He gave John that sweet, infuriating smile, the one he had only ever given to John after they had truly become friends.

"Yes, captain, but I didn't _try_ to kill you, I _succeeded_." John felt like tearing his hair from his scalp. He wished he had two working legs so he could kick James in the face with one of them and kick himself in the ass with the other.

James raised his eyebrows and tilted his head. "And?"

John threw his hands up. "And nothing, Flint."

"James."

" _Captain_ ," John said. "When I told Lady Hamilton what I did to you, it was with the understanding that she would keep you safe from me." He'd thought he had succeeded. When he finished with his story, she had looked seconds away from beating him to death with her mug of rum. John still wasn't sure if he would have let her. "Why are you here?"

James's smile slipped away. He stopped walking the perimeter and came to sit down on the other side of the table. Why had they given John two chairs? It certainly wasn't for John's comfort and convenience, as nothing about this conversation was comfortable or convenient.

James said, "I want to know why."

Goddammit. "I told her why," John said.

"Yes," James said, "and now I would like you to tell me."

If John had allowed himself to imagine this moment, he would have imagined James's fury, his hurt, his sense of betrayal. But now, here, James only seemed searching and curious. It was awful.

John said, "I don't want to. I'm tired of talking about it."

James said, "You might be, but I am not tired of hearing about it. And if we're going to be working together, I would like to understand."

This time John did pull his hair. "We are not going to be working together! I did my part. Mr Scott is managing the slave communities, you are facilitating the purchase of the estates. Vane is fomenting chaos in the colonies and Billy is encouraging rebellion. Soon Madi will be here, and you and she will hold it together. I have no place. I want no place."

He had realized it during those long, slow days of healing after he lost his leg. He'd had it confirmed when he saw Lady Hamilton's heartbroken face. His work, this time, had been to build a world that didn't need him. A world that could survive and thrive and be beautiful without him. This was what he had been brought back to do. And fuck James Goddamn Flint McGraw for trying to drag him into doing more.

James must have seen it in John's face. He sat back in his chair, tilted his head, lowered his eyes. He said, "Then say you owe it to me. Partial repayment for what you took."

John covered his face with his hands and breathed. That, he could not ever deny. And perhaps he also wanted a chance to plead his case again. He took a moment to fortify himself, and then looked up. "How many wars have you perpetrated?" he asked.

James said, "According to you, at least one."

"Oh, go fuck yourself," John snapped. "Do you have any idea what it's like? To see the cost of it, to watch men die and die and die, and to choose over and over again to keep going? How many times have you been the man to decide that it's not enough yet?"

James was quiet for a moment, and then he said, "This would have been my first."

"And mine as well," John said. "I had to choose, every battle, every day, every moment: yes, we will send more men to die. Men who trusted me. Men who were my brothers. Yes, do it, even though the next death might be yours, or mine, or," he swallowed. "Or Madi's. And after a while, I stopped understanding what we were fighting for."

"A war against civilization, you said." James didn't sound enthusiastic, thank fuck. He sounded mildly confused. What a transformation for James, having the man he loved returned to him.

"Yes," John said.

James raised his eyebrows. "Well, I was certainly ambitious."

"You were deranged," John yelled.

That, finally, seemed to give James pause. After long moments, he said, "Madness is a very difficult thing to define."

John sighed, the anger leaving him as quickly as it had come. "You weren't mad, you were consumed. You were immersed. You had bathed in vengeance and you wanted to baptize everyone around you." He leaned forward. "You told me over and over that the _next_ battle would be the decisive victory, the _next_ battle would change our fates. But it wouldn't have stopped, it would not have ever stopped."

Quietly, James said, "Perhaps some revolutions should not have an ending. Not when the thing they are fighting against is so heartbreaking."

John asked, "Did everyone agree with you? Revolutions need bodies, the same as farms, the same as ships. Did everyone agree that they wanted to throw themselves into the ocean and battle it until they drowned?"

"Well, did they?"

" _No_ ," John said, thinking of Billy. "In fact they did not. And you can't - you can't say you fight for the freedom of men, if you are forcing the men to fight for you. You can't take away their choices, and then tell them you are at war for their freedom to choose."

James said, "So you decided to take away my choices, was that it?"

That made John pause. "I have discovered," he said, "that in war, each of us eventually becomes what he most fears and despises. How long do you think it would have taken you to become England?"

James didn't answer. From downstairs came the sounds of laughter, the crash of plates dropped on the floor, the low whine of music.

Finally, James said, "So that was why."

"Yes," John said, feeling exhausted. "That was why. Are you satisfied now? Have I given you what you wanted?"

James said, "I cannot be sure, but I believe you have given more of yourself to all of us in these last weeks than you ever have to anyone else in your life."

John rubbed a hand over his face. "Why not? I'm old and I'm tired and I've already lost everything. I don't give a fuck anymore. Secrets become an intolerable burden after a while. Take them."

James frowned. "How old are you, truly?"

How old was he? John had not thought about it in weeks. He started to laugh. "I am sixty-eight," he said.

"Really."

"Why, don't I act like it?" At James's confused look, he laughed harder. It took him a long time to stop. When he finally did, he felt lighter, and it was easy to keep smiling. After everything, it was a gift to still be able to smile.

James watched him with that same gentle curiosity. It hadn't changed through their entire conversation, not really, and John had no idea what to do with this man. He supposed it was a good thing, then, that they wouldn't see each other after this, so he wouldn't need to figure it out.

John said, "For what it's worth, I don't think anyone else could have stopped you. You're safe now."

James said, "That's a comfort, actually. But I don't wish to be safe."

"What?" John asked.

"I understand why you did it. I can accept it. I don't believe I am the right man to forgive you, but if you need me to, I can forgive it. And after learning what you did, and seeing how you changed the course of all our lives when you had the chance - I find I would like to learn who you are, now, not just what you know of me."

John looked away. He wouldn't weep at this. James was being stupid, and reckless, and John would not be moved by it.

James said, "And besides, we'll need someone to help us prepare for Miss Scott's arrival."

The bottom dropped out of his stomach. "What?" John asked again. His poor heart started to beat furiously. He put a hand to his chest to try to hold everything inside of himself, all the feelings that threatened to burst out of him. He wasn't sure if he was successful.

James smiled that tall-man smile at him, the wretched fucking bastard. "Didn't I say? That was the other reason I came to see you. Madi Scott is coming to Nassau."

-

There was so much to _do_.

James's compromise with Lady Hamilton, it turned out, was that John was not allowed on the fledgeling council that was overseeing the infancy of their new republic. This meant that he was not part of the group of men who traveled to the interior to purchase the estates. He was not there when the slaves were freed. He was not present while the council squabbled over what they would need to plant, build and do in order to become self-sustaining. He was not part of it, but he knew everything anyway because James wouldn't fucking leave him alone.

"I need you to talk to Ellery," James said, coming into John's room without knocking.

John, who was recovering from the effort of staggering out of a hip bath and having to dress himself again, flopped back on his bed. "Who?" he asked.

James had begun his usual tiger prowl around the room as soon as he entered, but he stopped at this. "What do you mean, who?"

"I mean, who the fuck is Ellery?"

"You don't know?" James asked. "You know everyone."

It was difficult to shrug while lying down, but John managed. "He must not have been important," John said. "You do remember all of this was twenty-seven years ago for me?"

James sniffed, and resumed circling the room. John wondered what he could possibly be looking for, but didn't ask. "Ellery is old. Says he sailed with Henry Avery, not that anyone cares. He's not as stupid as the Boyd brothers, and not as weak-willed as Naft or Lawrence, and he does not like being told he can't hunt anymore."

"Ellery, Ellery," John said. "Wait, I _have_ heard that name before." He sat up. "That fucker took a pardon!"

James was over by the empty bookshelf, examining the wood as if it meant to tell him secrets. He said, "Then I imagine he is resistant to seeing a regime change where he is not the one in power."

"What does Max say?" John asked.

"He's got a wife at home. He never visits the brothel, never talks to any of her girls. Max tried to meet with him directly, and he's refusing to speak with her."

"Smart man," John said. Max's presence on the council was not a surprise, and neither was her role. She had put herself in charge of funneling men to the crews, jobs, past-times, industries, and communities she felt would suit them best in the new republic. A good half of the initial unrest from the Nassau pirates who objected to said new republic was snuffed out in the course of a single week, as Max sat down with each and every man and gave him what he had not known that he wanted.

"He'll talk to a pirate who lost a leg hunting treasure," James said, turning to look at him. "And you're almost as good as Max at sussing out where men belong."

John's mouth twisted. "Thank you, friend."

James grinned. And John went to speak with Ellery.

-

Another day, John was eating lunch in the common area at the inn when James came and sat down next to him. John speared a piece of beef on his knife and offered it.

James shook his head. "We're having trouble keeping men in the interior, to help build new homes for the freed slaves. They keep taking the money we pay and then walking off."

John frowned, and tilted his head. James rubbed his face.

"They don't like taking orders from me," He said. "Thomas says I'm too much a sea captain, and Eleanor says I speak to them like we're at war. I will admit," he sounded almost tentative, "that I am more comfortable in situations where I have to solve, or destroy, or hunt, than those in which I have to build."

"Why are you in charge of building the new dwellings anyway?"

James grimaced. "The crews won't listen to Mr Scott or Julius."

Of all the wretched - "They fucking will if I have anything to say about it," John snarled, making to stand up.

James grabbed the sleeve of his coat and pulled him back down. "Where are you even going to go? That's not why I came to you. Mr Scott and Julius have said they can both handle the disrespect of the men for now, and that once they realize the slaves communities are in charge of their dinners, they'll fall in line."

"Then why did you come here?" John asked.

James said, "Nothing gets built if nobody will build. Find me men who will do the work."

The next day John arrived at the Guthrie tavern with twenty of the sorriest, mangiest fighters in Nassau, including a feral Israel Hands.

"What the fuck is this?" James asked him, pulling him into Eleanor's office and shutting the door. Eleanor, thankfully, was nowhere to be found.

John slumped into the chair in front of the desk and crossed his arms. He said, "You asked me to find men who will do the work."

"Yes," James said, "and why did you not do as you promised?"

"I did!" John said, affronted.

"These men are worse than useless. I wouldn't even ask them to tie my rigging, and you want to let them loose near _children_? And that wild dog you brought back from the Wrecks can turn around right now."

John said, "These men will do the work, and they won't bother Mr Scott's people," he said. "Listen, how many fights has Carver gotten into in the last week alone?"

"I would be shocked it if was fewer than three," James said.

"And Overton?"

"More than I have the time or energy to manage. What's your point?"

"My point, captain, is that they need something to _do_. These men, these _particular_ men, are fighting because they see the world around them changing and they don't see a place for themselves in it. I offered them a place. They'll take your money, they'll take your orders and they'll build your houses. And they will not be a danger to the slave communities in the interior." This time he had made it absolutely fucking clear to them.

"How can you possibly be sure?" James asked.

"Because I fucking know what I'm doing!" John said, throwing up his hands.

And so the houses were built.

-

Another day, James knocked at the door of his room, and when John called, "Enter," he came and stood in the doorway, looking lost.

John asked, "What is it?"

James looked at him and didn't answer. Some days earlier, he had helped John to drag the little table over to the balcony overlooking the town. James did most of the dragging. On evenings like this, John liked to sit and watch the people walking home from work, and the moon in the sky. If he closed his eyes and concentrated, he could tease out the scent of woodsmoke from the miasma of wet dog and rotting wood and privy and tropical flowers that hung in the air of Nassau. Tonight, he motioned James to the other chair, and James stumbled across the room and sat.

"What is it?" John asked again.

James looked at his fidgeting hands. "What if she doesn't come back from Charles Town?"

John said, "She will."

James shook his head.

John said, "Captain. Lady Hamilton is the third most formidable woman I have ever met in my long life. She has a plan. She is forewarned. She has the support of Ashe's daughter. She will come back."

James looked at him. There was, for the first time in weeks, traces of the old Captain Flint in his gaze. John felt a thrill, as if they were about to go into battle together. He throttled the feeling before it could show in his face.

"You're not here for reassurances, are you?" John asked.

"What will you help me do, if she doesn't come back?" James asked him. "What will you keep me from doing? Give me my limits, now, because she is scheduled to arrive in three days and I don't know what will happen if she doesn't return."

John thought about it. "I will help you sail to Charles Town. I will help you torment every man who had a hand in bringing her harm. Peter Ashe will lose his fingers one by one. Any pain that she was caused, I'll see it returned threefold. If she's in prison, we'll release her. If she is dead, we will avenge her. And I will keep you from harming any other living soul in Carolina besides those who deserve it."

James sagged. "Thank you," he said.

-

Another day James came to him while he was sitting on the beach and watching the water. It was a strange thing, to be free to rest. It made John feel old, but watching the water and the land, making sure it was still there, brought him a measure of peace. James settled on the sand next to him and said, "I never asked where you got it. The Republic of Pirates."

"Oh, I don't remember," John lied. "I think I read it in a newspaper somewhere."

"A newspaper?"

John said, "It's a rare man or woman who can do a thing, without being first told by someone else that it is possible. I knew if I wanted peace in Nassau, I couldn't just give it a general, or a princess, or a treasure. I had to give it a name."

James looked out at the water and smiled. The smile grew bigger, and bigger, until James started to laugh. The sand merchants around them looked terrified. John felt like cheering. "You fucking -" James shook his head, still smiling. "I don't know why I'm surprised."

"I don't know why you are either. I'm not surprised that you built it."

"No?" James asked.

"You and Madi, Mr Scott and Max, Lord Hamilton and Lady Hamilton, and even Eleanor Guthrie - I have seen what each of you can build with no resources and no hope. I have seen what you can achieve. And you should know by now how good I am at telling a story."

"There is that," James allowed, tipping his head. He breathed out, and his grin shrank down to something less blinding. "I wanted to tell you, we have it."

"What?" John asked.

"It was a possibility before this, a chance, but I have felt for days now that the republic is alive. It is breathing air, it is growing in strength. And since you foolishly persist in removing yourself from council meetings -"

"I don't believe it is foolishness to want to keep your wife and husband from murdering me where I sit."

James looked shocked, perhaps at the word 'husband' or perhaps at the word 'murdering.' Then he shook his head and continued, "Since you persist, I thought I would come and tell you." He smiled that infuriating, sweet smile, and John felt a rushing inside of him as if something were about to take flight. "We've done it. It's ours."

-

And then, the next day, Mr Scott came to him. John was sitting in a corner of the brothel, watching in amazement as Max molded all their futures with her own hands. When Mr Scott sat down next to him, John pointed without looking away. "That woman is fucking spectacular," he said.

"And why is this?" Mr Scott asked, a smile clear in his voice. That made John turn to him. Mr Scott was always solemn, but today there was something joyous in his expression.

"See that man over there?" John said, turning back to the theater in the center of the brothel common area. Max was sitting across from a small, greedy-looking man who was dressed too richly in fabric too heavy for the Bahamas. Idelle was perched on his lap. " _That_ is a representative from the Dutch East India Company. Max's spies found him while he was passing through Port Royal on his way to sell pepper in Havana."

Mr Scott sat up straight. "What is he doing _here_?" The spice merchants were nearly as adamant in their hatred and fear of piracy as the magistrates in the Americas. "Tell me she did not spirit him away from his ship."

"Does that look like a man who was stolen from his very important, very lucrative stop in one of the riches ports in the Spanish colonies?" John nodded his head at them. The man in question took that moment to lick a finger and run it along the edge of Idelle's bodice. Idelle, goddamn professional that she was, smiled at him. "No, I believe Max has made him a better offer."

Mr Scott took a breath. "Protection," he said.

"Protection," John agreed. He had been marveling at the brilliance of it all morning, ever since he'd realized what he was looking at. "When we're done with this place, no pirate in the Americas will dare raise the black against one of our ships. Not unless they want to lose whatever safe haven they might find in this place, and enter a fight they are far from certain to win. We can guarantee passage through the Bahamas. We can guarantee it anywhere in the New World."

"Eleanor's consortium is growing," Mr Scott said, sounding proud. "We will control the shipping routes. Not just English shipping routes."

"And Nassau will still have its hunters, just - redirected." John sat back in his chair. "It's fucking incredible."

This was bigger than tobacco. It was bigger than sugar. And it was being secured, as many long-lasting changes were, not through bloodshed but through greed, back-room deals, and a visionary having the nerve to pull it off. If he hadn't thought Max was terrifying before, he certainly did now.

John and Mr Scott sat and watched as the spice merchant shook hands with Max, grinned like a child with a sweet, and yanked Idelle up the stairs. John poured Mr Scott a glass of wine from the bottle on the table, and they drank to the future. Only then, as the giddiness wore off, did he grow curious. "Were you looking for me?" he asked Mr Scott.

Mr Scott's smile faded, but the sense of tamped-down joy he carried with him today did not. He said, "The _Colonial Dawn_ just put into harbor. My wife and my daughter are aboard."

For a moment, everything stopped. John couldn't breathe. She was so close. After decades, after all this work, she was so very close.

"My daughter sent a messenger for me. She would like me to meet her, and bring the man named John Silver, so that she can see with her own eyes the architect of our people's future."

"You are the architect," John said, wide-eyed, heart beating madly. "Everyone. The council."

Mr Scott nodded, and John had a moment to think, Oh, that was a test, before Mr Scott said, "Its bard, then. Or perhaps its witness. Whatever you are to this revolution, my Madi would like to meet you."

There was nothing John could say to that but yes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> James's line, "the republic is alive. It is breathing air, it is growing in strength" is a remix of his line at the end of S4 to John: "This war was _alive_ , it was breathing air."
> 
> Next chapter: ENTER MADI FUCKING SCOTT, MY QUEEN.

**Author's Note:**

> Also I am on Tumblr now! Come find me at [hetrez](http://hetrez.tumblr.com/).


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